


In Which Stiles Finds He Much Prefers When Interesting Things Happen to Somebody Else

by Zoom Zoom (PaperLillyWebs)



Series: Teen Wolf AU's of Absolute Bullshittery [2]
Category: Howl no Ugoku Shiro | Howl's Moving Castle, Howl's Moving Castle - All Media Types, Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Howl's Moving Castle Fusion, Everyone is magical, Inspired By?, M/M, Magic, Magical Derek Hale, Magical Stiles Stilinski, More based on the book than the movie?, Werewolves, What do tag, there's some blood, this is a mess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-29
Updated: 2016-09-29
Packaged: 2018-08-18 14:13:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8164732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PaperLillyWebs/pseuds/Zoom%20Zoom
Summary: “Finish what you start,” the skull rasps at him, making him jump. When he looks up, the skull is just as still as before.   Loosely based on Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wayne Jones.





	

**Author's Note:**

> what is this

.|I|.

 

This was perhaps not the smartest way of going about this.

Stiles races down the empty streets screaming hail-Mary and trying not to run into the tightly-packed houses. Shutters are thrown open above his head, demanding explanation, and Stiles really wishes he could give the disgruntled people one, but you see… no one else could see it.

For not the first time since Hale had taken him under her wing, Stiles _wishes he had listened to her_. Of course, this is the first time he’s had to run for his life from one of the creatures Hale has hidden away in crates, but really, you think he would have learned to not stick his big nose in things that don’t concern him.

So, with a very large, very angry, very invisible kelpie chasing him through the quiet streets of Port Haven, Stiles makes a screaming vow not to open anything in Hale’s house without express permission again.

He skids around a corner and sees a small boy whistling to himself as he skips down the road. 

“Move!” Stiles shouts, waving his arms when the boy instead freezes. Not slowing down, Stiles grabs the boy by the arm and drags him along behind.

Now both screaming, they run towards the harbour, Stiles throwing out almost-spells and half-curses that his brain can’t finish in his hurry to outrun the rather wet clopping sound behind them.

Stiles shoves the boy into a passing alley and tells him to go home, as quick as he can. Thankfully, the kelpie only seems interested in Stiles, and leaves the boy alone.

With the harbour in sight, Stiles speeds up and jumps over a small garden wall onto the pier. There’s a pause in the clopping just before something slams into his back and knocks him flat on his face. 

“Pleasedon’thurtmeI’msorryforwakingyou,” he says in a rush, face mushed against the salty planks of the pier. He squeezes his eyes shut as the kelpie breathes hot, briny pants on the back of his neck.

There’s a bang from a nearby street and the weight of the kelpie is suddenly gone. Stiles lifts his head just in time to see the kelpie being thrown into the ocean.

“Why is it that whenever I tell you not to open this _specific_  box, you always seem to open it?”

Stiles groans and drops his head back onto the pier. “I don’t know; maybe I’m cursed.”

Hale snorts and easily yanks him back to his feet, giving him a once over before dusting him off a bit. “‘Could be a variation of the ‘Simon Says’ curse,” she agrees, but it’s all the hospitality Stiles gets before she’s dragging him back to the shop by his ear.

 

.|II|.

 

Really, after releasing Hale’s only kelpie, Stiles expects a much worse punishment than scraping out the leech tanks; he would have had to clean them by the end of the week anyway.

But unless Stiles is reading his master wrong, and he often is, he’d almost say she’s… proud of him?

She disappears off on one of her “missions” again before Stiles can ask, and, strangely, the shop feels even emptier than before.

He goes about his chores and works on the spells Hale had left behind for him, sometimes talking to the skull on the shelf, sometimes not. He’d known magic was lonely work long before his father had sent him away to “seek his fortune”, but he’s also pretty sure most witches have more than one pupil; he just happened to find the one that hates being a teacher.

On the third day of his master’s absence, Stiles has run out of bread and his stomach is growling. He takes a few of the coins from the last spell they’d sold and heads to the morning market, hoping Hale won’t notice.

The market is as bustling as ever, the townsfolk bidding him good morning, asking about this or that, “Oh, how’s your master doing?”, and Stiles really much prefers Port Haven over the mountain town Hale had had them in before; at least here, they get some sunshine, and if nothing else, that improves the people’s attitude. 

Stiles’ nose starts twitching as he’s looking at the fresh-caught fish, and can’t focus on what the monger is telling him; strange magic is itching under his skin and searching for a foothold, making Stiles’ stomach turn.

“Master wizard?” the monger asks, with the tone that he’d asked several times, and Stiles shakes himself.

“Sorry. Do you know if there are any other wizards in town?”

The monger booms out a laugh. “You’re always the first to know, master wizard! Mayor Jenkins is seeing a royal wizard today in the town hall.”

“Ah.” Stiles swallows and puts the fish he’s holding back. “His name?”

“How should I know?” he shrugs and turns to another customer when it becomes clear Stiles doesn’t plan on buying.

Stiles shakes himself again and hurries to the baker’s to pick up a loaf of bread, rushing through the pleasantries to get back to the shop.

He hops up the three steps and deposits the wrapped loaf on the nearest chair. “Some help you are,” he snaps at the skull as he starts rummaging through the mess that is his workbench in search of his crystal— “There you are.”

He sets the crystal ball on the dining table and stares at it. When nothing happens, he gives the surface a good flick, and only gets a broken nail for his trouble. Swearing under his breath, Stiles drops the crystal ball back onto his workbench and flops down onto one of the stools. He sticks his thumb into his mouth to worry at the nail, staring at the skull in hopes this would be one of the times it decides to chatter to life and help him.

He groans and drops his head back onto the tabletop. “Could go check it out,” he muses to himself, but even his poorly-functioning brain knows it’d be safest to wait for Hale to return.

 

.|III|.

 

The decision is made for him when the wizard in questions comes a’knocking at barely half-eight in the morning.

Stiles, having fallen asleep at the dining table trying to get his crystal ball to respond, jolts to his feet and knocks several books to the floor. He scrambles to the door, tripping down the steps as he goes.

“Hello, this is the home of the Great Witch of the Easte— Hello.”

The man on his stoop is not at all the sort of wizard Stiles would expect the Mayor of Port Haven to be meeting with: he is simply dressed, a bit on the scruffy side, and much younger than Stiles had thought.

The wizard looks Stiles up and down with furrowed brows and a distasteful tilt to his lips. “You are the master wizard the mayor mentioned?”

Stiles straightens and is suddenly very nervous about the state his hair is in. “I’m, uh, an apprentice.”

The wizard’s eyes dart to the sign hanging above the door. “Of Master Hale?”

“Yes, I’m sorry, she’s not here at the momen—”

“No matter, she doesn’t appear to be whom I’m looking for anyway.” The wizard turns away, but Stiles darts out a hand to stop him. The man snaps a glare to Stiles, and Stiles recoils fast enough that he smacks his hand on the doorjamb.

“Shit fucking—” he swears and hops around, shaking out his hand to get the pain to pass. The wizard watches him in disbelief, and yes, Stiles supposes he really doesn’t look like the apprentice of a well-known witch like Hale. “Sorry, I only meant to ask who you _are_  looking for?” he says, voice a bit on the rough side as he sticks his injured hand under his arm. 

The wizard takes a moment to respond. “The Hale I’m looking for would never take on an apprentice; she hates children.”

“I’m not children!” Stiles says indignantly, before he shuts his mouth with a snap. “I mean, I’m not a child.”

“Clearly.”

“Hale took me in as a favour, if that’s any consolation. What’s your name? I can tell her you stopped by when she gets back.”

Grunting, the wizard looks to his boots for a moment. “I’m not sure if I’d like her to know I’ve been here.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

He shrugs and turns to go again, but stops himself this time, spinning back around. “She owed someone a favour?”

Stiles frowns. “My dad helped her find someone, I think? They never told me.”

“Who?”

“My dad?”

“No, who did he help her find?” The wizard steps far too close for Stiles’ comfort, and if Stiles hadn’t been sure this was the wizard that had been fucking with his nose yesterday, he would be know.

“Excuse me, but if you could step back—”

The wizard _growls_  and non-too-gently shoves him against the closest wall. “Tell me, boy.” 

Okay, fine, he was attractive and normally Stiles would jump that in a heartbeat, but instead of maybe leaning forward flirtatiously, Stiles shoves at his chest with just a bit of his magic and manages to force him back a step.

The wizard stumbles, mostly in surprise, Stiles thinks, and looks at Stiles a bit differently than before. 

Stiles clears his throat. “I’m sorry, but since this isn’t the Hale you’re looking for, I’m afraid you must leave.” The wizard opens his mouth to argue, but Stiles slams the door in his face before he can get a word out.

 

.|IV|.

 

Hale returns several days later, halting as soon as she’s over the threshold. She looks sharply to Stiles, who is at his workbench chewing on a piece of bread.

“There was another wizard here?”

“Some lunatic who was way too touchy,” Stiles grumbles, getting to his feet to help Hale with her cloak. “He said he was looking for a Hale, but not you?”

Hale lets him remove her cloak, but absentmindedly. After a moment, she says, “Did he give you his name?”

“No, he said he’d rather you not know he’d stopped by. He seemed powerful?” he says this hopefully, not below searching for praise after the week he’s had. 

“Very,” she agrees and claps the fireplace to life. She seems to shake herself and turns back to Stiles. “Did you finish the studies I’d given you?”

“All but the last; we didn’t have any mandrake.”

She nods and puts a kettle over the fire. “Then you’ll have to go collect some. I have a list of herbs I’d like you to buy in town tomorrow as well.”

Stiles huffs. “Do I have to? The apothecary smells funny.”

Hale barks out a laugh. “You and that nose of yours! Yes, you must. I’ll give you some extra coin for sweets if you can show me all of the spells you’ve been working on.”

 

More than pleased with himself for being able to perform all off the spells near-perfectly, Stiles has a bit of a bounce to his step the next day on his way downtown.

Being a Sunday, the square isn’t nearly as crowded as it usually is, but there are still a fair few people milling about and chatting. Stiles is stopped several times for the week’s weather, and the kindly old Mrs. Henry from the hat shop tells him he’ll be needing a haircut soon.

He finally makes it to the apothecary and sucks in a breath before he enters. It’s empty save for one other customer and Old Man Roman behind the counter. He beckons to Stiles with a grin, moving away from the other customer.

“Master wizard! Witch Hale stopped by this morning to have me fill your order.”

This pulls Stiles up short. “She did?”

“On her way to see the mayor; she said you’d be by.” He reaches under the counter and produces a rather large parcel wrapped in brown paper. “Here we are. That’ll be eight-fifty.”

Stiles hands over the money and takes up the parcel. “Thank you, Roman.”

“That was very nice of Witch Hale, wasn’t it?” Roman says in a dreamy way, and Stiles rolls his eyes; no man, and most women, weren’t charmed by Hale.

“Yes, it was. I’ll have to thank her.”

“You do that, sonny.”

Stiles shakes his hand in goodbye and heads for the door. He pauses to ask, “You won’t by any chance be getting mandrake in any time soon?”

Roman cackles. “Not on your life, sonny!”

 

Stiles runs smack into someone right outside the apothecary door, not with enough force to fall, but enough for it to hurt.

“Sh—” He cuts himself off in case it’s a lady, but no, it’s the scruffy wizard. He looks at Stiles with as much surprise as Stiles feels. 

“Are you following me?” he demands, clutching his parcel to his chest.

The wizard fixes his expression into a sneer. “You wish, boy.”

Glaring, Stiles steps out of the way so the wizard can enter the apothecary. “I’m not a boy,” he says, sticking out his tongue at the wizard’s retreating back.

The wizard doesn’t seem to hear.

 

.|V|.

 

It’s late evening when Hale returns to the shop, flicking her wrist to turn the open sign to closed. 

Stiles looks up from his sorting the herbs into jars. “Welcome back. I was just about to head out for the mandrake.”

Hale waves her hand. “I wouldn’t go out tonight.” She heads for the stairs without explanation, and, truly, Stiles is good at respecting when she doesn’t want to explain things, but not tonight.

“Why not? I don’t have any other spells to work on.”

She stops with a hand on the railing. “The wizard is still in town.”

“I saw him at the apothecary. Is that a problem?” Stiles shuffles aside the herbs as Hale moves back to the table. 

“Stiles, I need you to promise me you will avoid this man at all costs. Don’t seek him out, don’t speak to him, don’t look into him.” She puts a hand onto the table to lean over Stiles, eyes just short of a glare.

“Why?” he stills asks, because he _isn’t_  good at keeping his mouth shut. 

Hale’s lips tighten. “Because I’m telling you so. He’s dangerous, and I never want him to return here.”

With that, she whisks up the stairs. Stiles sighs and drops his forehead onto the table, doing sums in his head for how much it would cost to find a new master.

 

“She didn’t make me promise not to go out tonight,” Stiles says to himself as he quietly lets himself out of the shop just before midnight. He’s got his thickest coat and a kappa-hide satchel, and an old lantern that Stiles doesn’t think Hale remembers having. 

Every other streetlamp is lit as he makes his way to the edge of town, the Summer moon bright enough to see at least a few feet in front of you. Stiles lights the lamp with a quick puff from his lips as soon as he’s out of the town, the strangely yellow flame casting even stranger shadows onto the ground. 

Stiles lets his feet guide him towards the marshes a good two miles out of town. They aren’t on any road, but Stiles trusts his feet; Hale says there is something odd about his sense of direction, but Stiles has never thought much of it.

As he enters a small copse of trees, he fondly remembers a time when the dark used to scare him out of his wits; his father had spent quite a pretty penny on candles for him for many years.

Now, though, Stiles feels rather at home. Even with the sparse teachings his mother had passed onto him, he hadn’t had any idea so much witchcraft was done in the dark. Perhaps it’s just the way that Hale teaches it, he thinks, stepping over a felled tree. 

It is quite cold, though, Stiles burrowing into his jacket as much as he can. Even in the summer, the port town gets all the cold North winds from over the ocean; frost crunches under his feet.

Just as he’s reaching the edge of the marshes, Stiles starts whistling a small tune to himself, turning his gaze to the ground for the ever-elusive mandrake. The lantern really doesn’t help, but it’s better than wandering around in the dark until he falls in a hole, he decides.

The moon peeks out from behind the sparse clouds and casts everything into even sharper relief, but, luckily for Stiles, it is just in time to spot a whole cropping of mandrake leaves. 

He kneels down and tugs on his kappa-hide gloves to start digging around the stalks. Even without a spade, the ground is soft enough to simply pull the roots from the ground, leaves and all. Stiles gleefully shoves several into his bag. 

Night noises don’t bother him much anymore either, but perhaps they should: he doesn’t hear the rustling and twig-snapping until they’re accompanied by a loud, rumbling growl.

Stiles freezes and looks up to find himself face-to-face with a huge black wolf, and if his twitching nose is anything to go by, this is no ordinary wolf. 

He yelps and jerks back before he can stop himself, stumbling onto his backside. The wolf doesn’t move except to keep growling, flashing its bright red eyes at Stiles. And Stiles doesn’t remember absolutely any of his dad’s lessons about how to get away from a wolf, how to kill it, but even if he did, he isn’t sure he’d be able to do either: he has no weapon and he doubts he can outrun a wolf that easily comes up to his chest. 

And the wolf still doesn’t move. Its growling gets softer, but it just keeps staring at Stiles, as if expecting something. 

“Uhm… hello?” he says hesitantly, definitely not having his master’s gift for communicating with beasts. 

The wolf blinks and stops growling all together, raising its head and its ears. It chuffs instead, licking its nose.

Stiles clears his throat awkwardly. “Uh, my name is Stiles. Nice to meet you.”

The wolf chuffs again.

“So, uh, I should really be getting back to town, so if you could… not eat me, that would be grand.” 

When the wolf still doesn’t move, Stiles swallows and slowly gets to his feet, dusting himself off. He picks up his bag and his lantern, feeling the wolf’s eyes following him. It takes a step back and to the side to give Stiles the space to head back in the direction of the town, clearly understanding what Stiles has been saying.

He clears his throat again. “Uh, thanks.”

He runs the whole way back to the shop.

 

.|VI|.

 

Hale doesn’t comment on Stiles’ exhaustion the next morning, though she seems distracted enough to maybe not even notice.

Stiles serves her a full breakfast before she heads out to once again speak to the mayor. When questioned as to why, she doesn’t respond other than to tell Stiles to pick up some fish from the market.

By the time Stiles steels himself enough to even leave the shop, it’s almost noon, and he has no idea when Hale will be back. All the way to the market, he reminds himself that it’s in the middle of town and there is no way a wolf could make it that far out of the forest.

The fishmonger greets him a bit less cheerfully than usual, but gossips with him all the same about how this farmer is losing his cattle and this fisherman drowned at sea last week, and where have you been, master wizard?

“Hale’s got me studying day and night,” he lies easily with a smile, paying for a lovely bass with brilliantly-coloured scales.

As the monger is wrapping the fish in waxed paper, Stiles’ nose starts twitching and his back goes ramrod straight.

But it isn’t the wolf, he doesn’t think. He looks over his shoulder to find the wizard from before haggling with the grocer, and lets out a short breath of relief. Not the wolf, then.

He takes the fish and tries to make it out of the market before the wizard notices him, but they look up at the same time and make rather awkward eye-contact. Someone shoves past Stiles when he freezes in the street, because did the wizard’s eyes _glow?_

The wizard looks away first, paying for his tomatoes with an odd look on his face.

Stiles turns and doesn’t have the breath to run.

 

“Stiles,” Hale barks, snapping in front of his face. Stiles jumps and looks up at her; she’s bending over to get right in his face, and the nasty twist to her mouth means she’s been calling him. “Have you got cotton in your ears, boy?”

He clears his throat. “No, sorry. ‘Lost in thought.”

“Clearly,” she says bitterly, and of course Stiles would lose focus when Hale is in one of her foul moods. Stiles hops to his feet, but still hasn’t figured out just how to escape her wrath when she’s like this.

He stumbles over his words to say, “Would you like some te—?”

She grabs him by the ear and tosses him out the now-open door, only saying, “Out,” before she’s slamming the door behind herself again.

Stiles sighs and flops down onto the doorstep. It isn’t often he’s thrown out, and something must have gone _really_  wrong with the mayor today if she’s locking him out as well. Of course, he can unlock the door in moments with his magic, but he unfortunately must wait for her to be in bed to even attempt opening the door.

“At least it isn’t as cold as last night,” he says to himself, leaning against the door to look out at the quiet street. The shop is on one of the more used residential streets, but it’s late enough that the only people passing are on their way home or heading to the pub.

He waves at the couple that lives down the road, smiling to reassure their worried looks. 

He’s got his eyes closed, listening to the bath run inside when someone clears their throat. Loudly.

Stiles jumps to his feet before he can remind himself that Hale is still upstairs. The scruffy wizard is looking at quizzically, arms crossed over his chest. 

“What are you doing here?” Stiles asks quickly, brushing the dirt from his trousers. 

“I could ask you the same thing.”

“Uh, I live here?”

The wizard does quite an impressive disapproving eyebrow. “On the stoop?”

“No, inside, stupid.” Stiles rolls his eyes, maybe mumbling a spell under his breath in hopes the wizard would leave in case Hale decided to look out the windows just then.

The wizard gives a snort and simply brushes off the spell. “That was weak, even for you.”

“I wasn’t trying very hard,” he sniffs. “Now what do you want.”

The wizard looks suddenly nervous, but the expression passes fast enough that Stiles isn’t sure if he’d actually seen it. “I… didn’t catch your name before.”

Stiles blinks. “My name? Why’d you want to know that?”

A quick shuffle of feet. “I like knowing people’s names, and the townsfolk just call you ‘master wizard’.”

“Uh. Stiles.” Names have power, Stiles knows, but as long as he’s —in a manner of speaking— under Hale’s roof, he also knows he’s protected.

“Stiles,” the wizard says, seeming to roll it over in his mouth for a moment. Then he holds out a hand. “I’m Derek.”

Stiles slowly shakes his hand. “I thought you didn’t want me to know your name?”

Derek shrugs, rubbing the stubble on his cheek. “I don’t want Hale to know my name; you are not Hale.”

“She’s my master, Derek; if she asks, I’ll have to tell.”

“She won’t ask.”

This makes Stiles frown. “You wanna explain that a bit more?”

“You want to explain why you’re locked out?” Derek nods to the closed door.

With a huff, Stiles leans against said door. “Hale kicked me out for a bit.”

Though he seems to be perpetually in a frown, Derek’s frown deepens. “That doesn’t seem right.”

“It’s better than being in there when she’s throwing a fit,” he shrugs. 

Derek looks up at the windows. “Now, _that_  does sound like the Hale I know.”

“Why’d you think she’s not the one, anyway? It can’t just be because she has an apprentice.”

Glancing back to Stiles, Derek considers him for a moment. “Maybe I just hope she isn’t the right Hale.”

“And why would that be?”

He gives the smallest of shrugs. “The Hale I know isn’t around anymore.”

“You two should really get together; you’re both grossly cryptic,” he huffs as a light breeze scatters what leaves have made it into the streets. 

Derek inhales a long, slow breath. “Perhaps. Excuse me, but it’s getting late and I have someone to meet. Goodnight, Stiles.”

Stiles blinks. “Just like that?”

Derek is already walking away, hands in his pockets. “Just like that.”

Stiles waits until Derek is out of sight to mutter, “Fucking foreigners.”

 

.|VII|.

 

Stiles manages to sneak back in before it gets too late, but decides to kip on the couch instead of risking the creaking stairs.

When Stiles wakes up, Hale is already off doing god knows what, her only goodbye a stack of new spells to master.

And master them Stiles does; he’s not particularly talented, but he can follow written instructions. Spells like these, with ingredients, and pre-written chants and the like, he can do these; it’s the ones that use imagination or creativity that bite him in the ass. The irony isn’t lost on him, either, that he can’t take a vocal order to save his life, but a step-by-step instruction is all he needs to make flowers grow in the dead of winter, or light a candle from across the room.

He still hasn’t got the hang of lighting the fire yet, but heaven help him if he doesn’t eventually get it.

 

On the ninth day alone in the shop, he gets three different orders for luck spells, and he can’t make large batches to save his life, so he spends the afternoon getting those ready for dawn the next morning.

A young girl comes in just before closing for a runny nose spell, and she’s too precious for words. Small and giggling with curly blonde hair wrapped up in high pigtails, she hugs his legs as she leaves.

Stiles watches her from the door to make sure she makes it home, and doesn’t notice Derek until he’s practically touching his arm.

Stiles nearly jumps out of his skin. “Toadskins!” he yips instead of swearing, and Derek is just as surprised as he is.

“Excuse me?” he asks, lips twitching.

“You surprised me.”

Derek… laughs? Coughs? Hiccups? “You’re not very observant.”

“That I am not,” he agrees, subconsciously checking the street for Hale. 

“Did you make it back inside the other night?” Hale leans his shoulder against the wall next to the door, perfectly framing himself to the setting sun. 

Stiles sniffs indignantly at the sight: Derek is probably doing this on purpose. “‘Just had to wait for her to go to sleep. And where have you been? ‘Haven’t seen you in the market recently.”

With a shrug, Derek rubs at his stubble again. A nervous tic? “I haven’t needed to go, really. I don’t eat much.”

Stiles scoffs. “You’re the fittest wizard I’ve ever seen; there’s no way you don’t eat like a horse.”

This gets another laugh-cough-hiccup-thing, and Stiles decides it’s rather cute. “I hunt for a lot of my food,” he explains. 

“There isn’t much but rabbit in the marshes.”

“I like rabbit,” he says, with that almost-smile.

Stiles shakes his head and turns to go back inside. “You’re impossible.”

“Nice to see you too, Stiles.”

Stopping on the first step, Stiles looks back at him. “Why do you keep showing up here, anyway? ‘Still trying to figure out of this is your Hale?”

The smile is gone, leaving something cold and closed-off in its wake. “Perhaps. Have a good evening, Stiles.”

Stiles watches him walk towards the harbour until it gets too dark to see him.

 

.|VIII|.

 

“We’re moving,” Hale announces the moment she gets back, startling Stiles enough that he almost spills stew all down his front.

“What?”

Hale starts walking through the room, waving her hands and muttering so the contents of the shop start tidying themselves into boxes that appear out of nowhere. Stiles watches her with wide eyes, and finds himself… sad?

Sure, he likes Port Haven, but he’s usually pretty glad to move. Like Hale, he doesn’t like staying in one place for long.

“We’ll be on the dawn train,” Hale tells him, tossing her cloak over a chair to roll up her sleeves. “We’ll need mandrakes for the new shop, so make sure you go out and get some tonight.”

“Of course.” Stiles’ throat is strangely tight, not in a weepy way, more… he doesn’t have the best feeling about this. “Where are we going?

“Kingsbury.”

Stiles swallows, shifting on his stool uncomfortably. “Why Kingsbury?”

“I thought you wanted to live in a city.” She starts to shrink down the boxes so they’ll all fit into a rather large trunk.

Stiles shakes his head and doesn’t respond, returning to the stew that doesn’t look all that appetising now. 

Hale ruffles his hair as she passes. “Cheer up; there are lots of pretty boys in Kingsbury for you to toy with.”

Stiles huffs.

 

Despite having mandrakes from his previous escapade to the marshes, Stiles still leaves just before midnight, bundled up and miserable. 

The shop had been completely packed up by supper, though Stiles had only just finished packing his own things. He loved his room in this shop, all the little places to hide things; he’ll miss it.

He doesn’t whistle on his walk, rather grumbles to himself about Hale as he kicks at loose stones or small mushrooms. His lantern flickers a bit at his mood, not quite staying lit like it should, and it only makes his mood worse.

By the time he reaches the mandrake patch he had found before, he’s worked himself up into such a state that he has to sit down and just breathe for a while.

Something isn’t right with Hale, with this whole situation, but the worst part is, Stiles can do nothing about it. Even if he had the skills, the power, he’d be too much of a coward to stand up to Hale if something were truly wrong.

Stiles makes a sharp noise of frustration and tugs at his hair, staring hard enough at his lantern to see spots. 

The bushes in front of him give a mighty rustle, and the black wolf from before pushes into the small clearing. It shakes out its fur and chuffs at Stiles as he freezes.

“Hello,” he says weakly. “I, uh, hope you don’t eat me this time either.”

The wolf chuffs again and plops down onto its haunches, one ear up and the other cocked in a very puppy-like way. It just watches Stiles, and it really doesn’t look half as menacing as it had before.

“Uh, so, what are you doing here?” Stiles asks when the silence has stretched on too long. The wolf seems to shrug. “Yeah, me too. My master doesn’t know I was out here before so she thinks we still need mandrakes.” Stiles forces himself to relax, sitting criss-cross so he can tug at the damp grass. 

The wolf carefully lays down, but doesn’t move any closer to Stiles. It thumps its tail on the ground once. 

Stiles looks down to avoid its red eyes, the look of them making the hair on his arms stand up. “Truthfully, I like to move,” he mumbles, because the wolf seems to be listening and interested. “but tomorrow?”

The wolf makes a little grunting noise of protest and scrambles back up. It trots forward, and Stiles is sure it's going to bite his face off, but the wolf just jabs at his cheek with its wet nose and makes the noise again.

“Why do you care?” Stiles gently shoves away the wolf’s snout. Instead of biting him, the wolf nudges his hand until it can rub its head all over it. “Hey, hey, pal, take me to dinner first.” The wolf stops to give him a look that can only be described as unimpressed, before it goes right back to nuzzling. 

Stiles lets it, maybe starts to scratch its head and behind its ears. It flops down to put its head in his lap, and Stiles makes a mental note to read through Hale’s collection of animal books.

“You sure are odd, aren’t you,” he tells the wolf, rubbing the spot between its brow. “You act like you know me, but you’ve seen me twice.” The wolf seems to shrug again. “And you’re more human than animal. Are you cursed, friend?”

The wolf raises his head and looks right at Stiles, and if there was anything to give him the chills. “What?” The wolf blinks. “You _are_  cursed?”

Putting its head back down, it snuggles into Stiles’ thigh. “You don’t feel cursed,” Stiles mumbles, more to himself. “‘Must be pretty powerful.”

The town bell echoes its two o’clock chime and surprises both Stiles and the wolf. Stiles scrambles up, swearing. “Sorry, friend, but I promised Hale I’d be back by three.”

He bends down and yanks at a couple of mandrakes, because a few more can’t hurt, swearing under his breath. 

The wolf stands as well and watches him until he straightens. 

“You take care of yourself, okay? The mayor doesn’t like wolves much.” He gives the wolf a pat on the head, and gets a lick in thanks. Pleased, and feeling much better, Stiles hurries back to town. 

Luckily, Hale hasn’t woken by the time Stiles sneaks back in.

 

.|IX|.

 

Kingsbury isn’t anything like Stiles had expected. Sure, he’d figured the big, opulent buildings, the girls with their parasols and fans, but everything is really… clean. Scarily clean. When he mentions it, Hale tells him the royal wizards bespell the streets, but even the _people_  are clean. 

The shop Hale finds for them is nicer than any of the others they’ve had, with carved oak banisters and cherry cabinets with gold handles, and they even have a courtyard with a little fountain topped with a wrought-iron cherub. It’s closer to the centre of town than Stiles had thought, and is always busy, but Stiles likes people, a lot, so he doesn’t mind that so much.

Many of the people living in Kingsbury are bright, young things with bright, young ideas and Stiles learns more from hearing about their days in a week than he ever learned in Port Haven. But then there are the older folk that come ‘round with their noses turned up, that don’t like boys practicing magic. Many an old man had come into the shop for a spell but turned away as soon as they had seen Stiles, claiming they’d never trust a boy to do something as complex as magic.

Mostly it doesn’t bother him, and when it does, he pushes it aside because Hale doesn’t seem to care at all.

Stiles misses Port Haven the most in the evenings, when he can’t quite watch the sunset through the pollution and buildings, but he still eats at the westward window, chatting to the skull about this or that that had happened that day. The skull never responds, but it’s better than talking to no one, he supposes.

 

A royal witch stops by a few weeks after they had moved in, with a letter from the court sorcerer welcoming them to the city.

She’s just as bright and young as most of Stiles’ customers, and wears her brown hair down instead of in the tight, elaborate curls that most of the Kingsbury women sport. Her name is Cora, and Stiles quite likes her; if her beaming smile and frequent jokes are anything to go by, she quite likes Stiles too.

It’s a slow morning, with few customers, so they talk until almost noon, when Cora straightens with surprise as she looks to the clock.

“I really should be going,” she says to Stiles, “but it was very nice to meet you. You should stop by the palace sometime and meet my brother.”

Stiles snorts and shakes her hand over the counter. “Yes, I’m sure the king would just love having an apprentice distracting his top witches and wizards for an afternoon.”

She considers this. “You could bring your master with you; I’m sure he wouldn’t protest then.”

“Hale?” Stiles laughs. “She hates uppity-folk.” He stands to walk Cora to the door, but Cora has frozen and gone completely pale. “Are you al—”

“Did you say Hale?” she asks quickly, grabbing his wrist.

He frowns. “Yes? It’s on the sign outside.”

“I didn’t see it. Do you— What’s her first name?”

Gently removing her grip on his wrist, Stiles puts his hand on her shoulder. “I’m not to know, until I’ve completed my training. Why?”

“She— I think she might be someone I know.” Cora swallows and looks around the shop with a manic sort of interest, searching for answers.

“You’re not the first person to say that to me.”

Cora stops her search abruptly. “Who?”

He debates telling her, as Derek wasn’t all that keen to have his name spread around in Port Haven, but she’s a royal sorcerer, isn’t she? “He said his name was Derek? I met him in the town I lived in before.”

If possible, Cora goes even paler. “Excuse me,” she squeaks and flees the shop.

 

.|X|.

 

Stiles doesn’t mention the incident to Hale, though she does look suspicious after a good sniff of the shop upon her return from wherever she disappears to. He hands over the king’s welcome letter, and she burns it without reading it.

Other than that, life in Kingsbury is somehow quieter than Port Haven. The most excitement he gets in a day is when he botches one of the spells Hale had left for him, or when the skull decides to have a fit about the dust collecting on the workbench.

That is, until another royal wizard shows up, panicked and pale.

He bursts in without knocking, surprising Stiles enough that he knocks the growing potion he’s working on onto the floor. 

Stiles just kind of stares at the mess of purple goo and glass for a moment, then looks to the wizard — and he is a wizard, Stiles’ nose knows there’s no doubt about that. 

“Can I help you?” Stiles asks blandly, wondering how much dragon liver costs in Kingsbury.

The wizard starts to wring his hands, and Stiles decides he could be quite attractive if he didn’t look a moment from shaking apart. “I am Wizard Lahey from the palace, and we received a tip that you were the last person to see Witch Hale.”

Pulled up short, Stiles doesn’t respond right away. “My master?”

Lahey looks surprised. “What? No, Witch Cora Hale.”

“She was here last week,” he says, frowning. “but I didn’t know her last name was Hale.”

Lahey opens his mouth, but no sound comes out, and he’s really starting to look like he’s said too much. He clears his throat with a bit of a squeak. “She hasn’t been seen since, and we had been hoping you would know where… she’d gone.”

Stiles really does find it odd that the palace could just lose one of their witches, but he supposes if she didn’t want to be found. “I, uh, I’m sorry, but she hadn’t said anything to me,” he finds himself lying, part of him wanting to help them, but most of him knowing loyalty to one’s master is paramount. Two powerful sorcerers looking into Hale —his master Hale, that is— isn’t coincidence, and, well, better safe than sorry?

Deflating, Lahey just nods, before pulling out a small piece of cardstock. “If you hear anything about her, call this number. I probably won’t be the one to answer, but.” He clears his throat. “Thank you for your help.” He gives a little bow and leaves the shop in a hurry.

Stiles stands there in the empty shop for a moment, then looks to the skull for an explanation. And he actually looks ready to give one, when the door is thrown open and Hale is flying into the room with her hair and cloak flapping wildly. She slams Stiles up against the back wall, and Stiles swears he can see fire between her teeth.

“What did you tell them?” she booms, rattling all the windows and bottles in the shop. Rather preoccupied that there is most definitely flames licking at the back of Hale’s throat, Stiles almost forgets to reply, and then stumbles over his words so much that he can’t get a coherent thought out.

Hale all but screams and throws him to the side, Stiles narrowly missing the remains of the growth potion as he lands on the floor.

“I knew I shouldn’t have taken an apprentice,” Hale is saying loudly to herself, starting to pace with her hair still flying about her head. “They warned me about the likes of you.” She says this in Stiles’ direction, but not quite at him. Stiles, too scared to move, just watches her pace until he plucks up the courage to say,

“I didn’t tell them anything.”

Hale freezes, then spins around to look at him. “You what?”

“I didn’t tell them anything.” He pushes himself up a little, as locks of her hair start to settle back down. “They weren’t asking about you; one of their royal witches is missing. ‘Had nothing to do with you.”

She deflates completely, looking down at him in part confusion, part disbelief. “You didn’t tell them anything?” she repeats. “But they were from the palace.”

“Should I have told them something?”

“Most apprentices would have spilled all of my secrets.” She smooths back her hair and goes to the fireplace to clap it to life.

“I wasn’t aware you had secrets to keep from the government.” With the fear passing, bitterness takes its place; Stiles doesn’t get to his feet for fear he’ll take a swing at Hale. 

She looks at him sharply. “And the witch from before?”

“She didn’t ask anything about you,” he lies, and for some reason, Hale seems to believe _that_. 

She nods to herself, rubbing at her arms as if she were cold. Then she straightens and turns a sneer to him. “What are you on the floor for? Get up and clean up this mess.” She strides past him for the stairs, and doesn’t bother to look back before she slams the bathroom door behind her.

 

Stiles doesn’t sleep that night. He sits in the courtyard on the edge of the fountain, with a blank piece of parchment and a quill in his lap. He stares at it until the knocker-ups are starting to make their rounds, but instead of penning a letter of resignation to Hale, he writes a quick, watered-down update letter to Scott. He hadn’t written his childhood friend in far too long, and he supposes an update of address is as good a time as any.

He cleans up the potion and makes breakfast before Hale rises. When she comes downstairs, she acts as if the previous afternoon had not happened, sitting at the table with him and talking amicably about the Kingsbury residences, about the brightly coloured buildings. She doesn’t seem to notice Stiles doesn’t say a word.

She leaves without her cloak, but in her best robes, and Stiles wonders if she’s going to the palace. She of course doesn’t tell him, just leaves him a marginally more complicated spell than normal, instructing him to remake the growth potion while he’s at it.

He waits until he’s sure she’s gone to grab his cloak, with the intention of heading to the market to clear his head. But when he opens the door, Derek is on the stoop looking quite surprised to see him.

“Uh, Derek. Hi.” Having been mid-step down a stair, Stiles settles on the last step, and Derek looks like a deer in the headlights. “What are you doing here?”

Derek is much better dressed than when Stiles saw him last, with brass buttons and a fine cotton shirt. He’s a little more clean-shaven, and his cloak looks a lush, dark velvet; he looks… really good.

And Stiles is oddly relieved to see him, even though it doesn’t look like Derek had been seeking him out. Stiles doesn’t have many friends that aren’t back in his home village, and Derek had been as close as he got in Port Haven, he thinks. 

Derek clears his throat awkwardly. “I, um, live here.”

“On the stoop?”

Derek’s eyebrows do a funny little dance, and his lips look like they might smile, but the expression is gone as quick as it had come. “I was only visiting Port Haven for a time. I work in the palace.”

Stiles startles. “You’re a royal wizard?”

“Yes; did you not know?” Derek says, frowning. “The town couldn’t stop gossiping about it.”

Sheepish, Stiles rubs the back of his neck. “Oh, well, I wasn’t much up on the gossip before I left. ‘Moving, you know.”

Derek nods like he understands.

“So, uh, what brings you here? Not to Kingsbury, to here, to the shop, to uh,” Stiles trips over himself, and instead of annoyed, Derek just seems vaguely amused. 

“Isaac mentioned meeting you.” At Stiles’ blank look, he adds, “Wizard Lahey. I was curious to know if you were… the same. As from Port Haven.”

“Oh.” A royal wizard, interested in him? Even if it was just a vague curiosity, Derek still made the trip all the way from the palace.

Ice settles into his bones as he realises that that is likely where Hale had gone that day. He looks quickly up and down the street, then behind himself for good measure. “Er, it’s very nice to see you again, but I’m afraid my master doesn’t like other sorcerers very much, and I’m not sure when she’ll be back—”

“Stiles, are you scared?”

The question surprises Stiles into silence, perhaps more for the sincerity than the question itself. “What?” he asks weakly.

“Are you scared? Of Hale?”

Stiles coughs. “No more than any other apprentice. Hale has a bit of a temper, but it isn’t anything I can’t deal with.”

Derek looks unconvinced, taking a step closer. “Stiles, what’s her first name?”

Stiles blinks at him, then grumbles. “You too? I told you all before, I’m not to know. Despite popular belief, she doesn’t trust me all that much?”

“Us all?” Derek asks. “What do you mean?”

Stiles shrugs and leans against the doorjamb, much less into this conversation now that he knows Derek only stopped by to badger him with more questions. “Your pal Cora? She was here last week, asking about Hale. Are they related, by the way?”

Derek’s tone goes much more urgent. “You saw Cora before she disappeared?”

“Yeah, she left as soon as I mentioned you.”

“Me?” he blinks.

“I mentioned that you’d been asking around too.” He picks at the loose threads on the sleeve of his cloak, once again wondering if he should have kept his mouth shut. “Ran off in quite a hurry.”

He looks up in time to see Derek step back into the street with an apologetic look. “I’m sorry, Stiles, but I— I have to go.” With no other explanation, Derek turns and all but runs down the street, disappearing at the nearest corner.

Suddenly a bit ill, Stiles closes the door and wanders off for a nap.

 

.|XI|.

 

Stiles stays in bed for the remainder of the day, feeling quite queer and clammy. Every now and then, he wonders if Derek had hexed him.

Hale returns sometime around supper, but doesn’t seem to notice his absence, humming to herself as she fiddles about downstairs.

Soon, it smells of cooking spinach and pork, but the smell just makes Stiles feel even more queasy, and buries his face in his pillow.

Hale is still humming when she comes upstairs, but cuts off abruptly as she’s passing Stiles’ door. He cringes and hopes she’ll think him asleep, but she knocks and opens the door.

“Stiles, there’s a parcel on your doorknob.”

He peeks up over his thick blankets to look at her in confusion. “What?”

“What need have you for a protection spell this strong?” She holds up a small black pouch that Stiles has never see before. But she seems convinced it’s his, tossing it to him before closing the door again.

Stiles only barely manages to catch it and ends up quite tangled in his blankets for his trouble. 

The pouch makes his nose twitch, and it really does feel quite powerful. He cautiously opens it and finds a thick brass ring with a small gem inlaid into it. It’s surrounded by lavender and basil, and Stiles has never seen this before either.

Carefully taking it out, he rolls it over in his palm several times. A gift? But who had managed to get it onto his door?

“Someone powerful,” he mumbles to himself, voice a bit rough from underuse. He slips it onto his thumb —the only finger it will fit— and instantly feels much better. His frown only deepens, and he searches through the pouch for further explanation. Buried in the herbs is a tiny slip of paper that magics itself larger when he removes it from the pouch.

 

_For protection. Keep it close._

_D.H._

 

“Derek?” he wonders aloud, but, of course, receives no answer.

 

He is still shaky when he rises the next morning, but with the knowledge that Hale would start to ask questions if the shop were closed for another day, he goes about business as usual, if a bit more sniffily. 

His customers are all quite kind and sympathetic of his condition, one even leaving him with a small jar of honey for his scratchy throat. By the end of the day, many of them are calling him “Master Apprentice”, which is more flattering than he would have expected; in Port Haven, anyone of magical background was respected, but here, where magic is common and abundant, the regard turns him a bit giddy. 

In between customers, he idly puts together a finding spell, but has nothing of Cora’s to put in it, so it is left unfinished.

Hale actually pops in and out throughout the day, in a much better mood than Stiles has seen her in a while. She even makes him a pot of tea just after lunch, telling him to feel better. Something really good must have happened. 

Suspicious, he starts to ask the customers if anything had happened at the palace recently. 

“Oh, Witch Cora is missing, isn’t she?” one young women tells him as he makes her a combat spell.

“I think Wizard Derek has gone on another one of his trips,” a palace solider tells Stiles after accepting his acne potion.

“There’s going to be a party in honour of the princess’ birthday, you know,” an older woman gushes to him. “Only the absolutely highest of society are invited.” She thanks him for her rheumatism rub and leaves. 

But nothing of Hale’s visit to the palace is mentioned; he starts to think perhaps she had gone somewhere else. 

He finds himself fidgeting with the ring on his thumb more and more as the day progresses, spinning it whenever he is feeling a bit queer. He doesn’t know if it is more of a placebic effect than anything, but it helps, and belief is the basis of magic anyway. A young lady asks him if he has someone courting him, sounding genuinely interested, but Stiles waves her off with a laugh.

The final customer is a middle-aged man asking for a paralytic for his arrows, and Stiles is hesitant to give it to him. Hale never much cared if customers asked for darker spells, as long as no one was killed, but it had never quite sat right with Stiles.

“What’re you hunting?” Stiles asks conversationally as he opens one of the many cupboards and tries to find the weakest paralytic they have. 

The man shifts uncomfortably. “A wolf. For the king.”

“What use does the king have for a wolf?” He grabs the jar of distilled lavender, hoping the man won’t notice that it would do nothing more than sting a bit more than a normal arrow.

“Classified.” The man leans against the counter, and his black leathers sure do make him look like a hunter.

Stiles pours some of the distillation into a bottle and corks it, sealing it with bright blue wax. “I’m not sure why you couldn’t get this from the palace sorcerers,” Stiles tells him, handing the bottle over the counter. “They have access to much better herbs than I.”

The man slips far too much money to him, even if Stiles had given him what he’d asked for. “Witch Cora was unfortunately their poison expert, and with her missing…” The man shrugs and salutes Stiles on his way out the door.

 

.|XII|.

 

Stiles spends the next morning poking at his finding spell and wondering if he could possibly substitute something for one of Cora’s possessions. 

“A piece of paper with her name?” he asks the skull to no response. “I wonder what her birth flower is.”

He tries several things, but the spell remains still as ever. Normally, he would ask Hale, but something is… off about her, when it comes Cora, and Derek. And not knowing who to trust at the moment, he lets sleeping dogs lie.

Being a Sunday, business is slower than ever, Stiles helping a grand total of three customers by closing, and none of them have any other gossip for him. The spells require hardly any of his attention and leave his mind much to occupied with his instinct to run and his guilt to stay.

Hale had sacrificed a lot to take him in. He had to remember that.

As he flips the sign to closed, his ring grows a bit hot, but it passes before Stiles can inspect it. When he twists it, it is just as cold as ever.

Weary, he makes himself a small dinner, talking to the skull all the while about the finding spell. The skull doesn’t ever answer, but it does start to chatter a bit when he suggests maybe substituting a bit of his own blood instead of ink.

He had planned on going to bed early, but he’s now too curious to sleep, and pulls out his spell again. He tries a few more things before getting out a new quill resignedly; he’s never been too fond of blood magic, what with his poor reaction to such things, but if he is going to listen to his gut on one thing, it’s going to be to find Cora. 

He pricks his finger with a sharp needle and uses the quill to scribble out Cora’s name; he thanks his stars he knows her last name. When he drops this slip of paper into the spell, it makes a loud popping noise and releases several purple sparks. He jumps back a bit to avoid getting burned, but they just land on the map he had laid out, burning a small circle around the town of Port Haven.

Stiles looks to the skull in hopes of some explanation, but it is silent. 

With a sigh, he leans down to inspect the map closer, but can’t figure anything else from it. As he rubs the pad of one of his fingers over the burns, he gets a strange feeling and suddenly thinks of the wolf.

He pulls back and rubs his hands over his face. “I’m working too hard,” he mumbles into his palms. “I met the wolf before Cora went missing.”

He cleans up the spell and puts the skull back on his shelf, tucking the folded map into his pocket. He makes sure Hale won’t be able to tell what the had been doing, and goes to bed.

 

It’s far too early when someone starts banging on the front door, Stiles trying to burrow further into his mattress and ignore it.

But whoever it is is very insistent, enough so that when Stiles rolls out of bed and stumbles downstairs, he has a few choice words and maybe a hex or two at the tip of his tongue.

He yanks open the door, halfway through his first hex, but he stumbles to a stop when he realises that it’s Derek standing there, out of breath. 

Derek locks eyes with him and seems to relax a little. “Stiles, thank god.” He pushes past Stiles into the shop, and Stiles is too surprised to stop him. He closes and locks the door again, following Derek up the steps. Derek spins around to face him. “I need your help.”

Stiles blinks. “What? Why?”

“I need to find Cora, I’ve tried everything and the king isn’t happy that he can’t find either of us.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be one of the country’s top sorcerers?” Stiles finds himself asking instead of any number of much more relevant questions. 

Derek looks exasperated. “Didn’t you hear me? Nothing is working. Something is blocking me. Someone knows I’m looking for her.”

Still not quite awake, Stiles rubs at his eyes and tries to get his brain functioning. “Why did you come to me?”

This seems to surprise Derek as well. “What do you mean?”

“Couldn’t you have asked one of your colleagues?”

He shakes his head. “No, whoever is blocking me is blocking them too. They won’t suspect someone like you.”

Stiles crosses his arms over his chest and realises he isn’t wearing a shirt. “What, because I’m an apprentice?”

“No, because they underestimate you.”

Well, isn’t that a bit flattering. Stiles coughs as much, but Derek really does look in a hurry. “I— Uhm, she’s in Port Haven.”

Derek looks ready to thank him, before his brain catches up and he stops in surprise instead. “What? How do you know?”

“I might have done a finding spell last night. Wait here.” He runs up the stairs to grab the map, and a shirt, and returns to find Derek exactly as he’d left him.

Stiles lays out the map on the table. “It isn’t as exact as I’d like,” he admits, “but I haven’t had a finding spell go wrong yet.”

Derek stands a bit too close than strictly necessary to look at the map. “It’s enough. Thank you, Stiles.” He puts a hand on Stiles’ shoulder, and his ring sears hot for the split-second Derek is touching him.

Stiles yelps, startling Derek. “You’re the one who gave me the ring?”

“Yes?” Derek’s voice sounds a bit weak, and is he… embarrassed? “Was that not clear?”

“Oh, uh, you just signed it with your initials. I wasn’t sure.” Stiles swallows and feels heat climbing up his collar. “Thank you. This ring couldn’t have been cheap.”

Derek shrugs it off, but Stiles thinks his ears are red. “I wish I could stay, but I need to find Cora. The king, and I, are in your debt. Thank you.” Before Stiles knows what’s happening, Derek is giving him a swift peck on the cheek and leaving too quickly for Stiles to stop him.

When it finally clicks what had happened, Stiles chases after him, but when he opens the door, the street is empty.

 

.|XIII|.

 

For the rest of the day, his ring gives off short bursts of heat, and it gets bothersome enough that he takes it off and stuffs it into his breast pocket. He can still feel it, but it is easier to ignore when helping customers.

The young lady that had asked about his courting before comes in for an anti-staining spell, and leans over the counter to tell him some lady witch had come to visit the king the day before.

Stiles perks up at this information. “Oh? Do you remember her name?”

“Silver, I think it was; I didn’t get a first name. But she was absolutely gorgeous! ‘Charmed the socks right off the king.” She spins her parasol a bit excitedly. “I heard she was asking a lot of questions about the royal sorcerers; rumour has it she’s responsible for Witch Cora’s disappearance.”

That did sound like Hale, if her reaction to Lahey was anything to go by. But Silver? Her first name, perhaps?

“Oh, Stiles, I wanted to ask if your master is related to the Hales? People are starting to gossip.”

Stiles shrugs and ties a little string around the lady’s spell. “I’m not actually sure; she isn’t around much.”

The lady looks sympathetic. “That’s a lot of time all alone in this shop. Don’t you get lonely, Stiles?”

“Of course! But I spend most of the day making spells, so I’m pretty occupied.” He takes her three shilling and deposits it into the register —and hadn’t it been fun trying to figure _that_  out.

“You should get out more. I’m hosting a little party tomorrow night; you should come!”

Stiles just smiles politely. “Now, are you courting me, miss?”

She laughs. “Unfortunately for you, I am engaged.” She fiddles off her glove to show a simple but beautiful engagement ring. Stiles coos and takes her hand to look closer at it. 

“Who’s the lucky fellow?”

“One Sir Vernon Boyd of his majesty’s sorcerers.” She grins at Stiles’ raised eyebrow.

“Ah, and this is where you get all of this gossip, is it?” He releases her hand to let her put her glove back on.

“M’afraid you magic folk sure like to talk. But enough about me; where’s _your_  ring, master apprentice?”

Stiles laughs a little and pulls it out of his pocket. “It’s a charm, and it seems to be having some trouble today.” He sets it on the counter between them, the lady leaning forward to inspect it. Her smile fades a little. “Something wrong?” he asks, trying to look at her face.

She shakes herself and her bright smile is back again. “Just thought it looked familiar, but I must be mistaken. Now, I must be off before my fiancé misses me, but here, I’ll give you my address.” She grabs at his small stack of papers and scribbles out a name, address and time. “It’ll be a small affair, so you shouldn’t be too overwhelmed; just a couple of Vernon’s friends from the palace. We’d love to have you, Stiles.”

She leans over to give him a small kiss on the cheek, taking up her spell and trotting back out of the shop.

Stiles shakes his head and reads over the slip of paper. “Erica Reyes, huh?” He tucks the paper into the register and actually considers going. But then Hale returns, looking chipper, and Erica, and the party, are quickly forgotten.

 

Hale insists they sit down for dinner together that evening, but unsurprisingly makes Stiles cook. Once they’re settled, she starts asking about the shop, about the customers. Stiles tries to muster up some enthusiasm, but he oddly feels like something had broken between the two of them; Hale doesn’t really notice.

He tries to put it from his mind and instead asks, “I heard there was a witch visiting the palace the other day?”

She goes a bit still and looks at him sharply. “And?”

“I was just wondering if you knew her,” he says innocently, getting up to refill their water glasses. “Some of the customers were mentioning it.”

“You’re a horrible gossip, Stiles,” she says instead of answering, rising to her feet and disappearing upstairs. 

Stiles can’t stop the peculiar feeling that that had been all but a confession.

 

.|XIV|.

 

Stiles finds Erica’s paper again near the end of the next day, and puzzles it over until closing. Sure, it could be fun, but what if Derek is there? And he hasn’t had the best experience with any of the royal sorcerers; it’d perhaps be in his best interest not to seek them out. 

But Hale hadn’t left him any spells to work on, and he’d received no orders from customers for the next day, so there really wasn’t… any reason for him not to go?

And, despite himself, Stiles really did like Erica; she always seemed to brighten up the place, and Stiles remembers his dad once saying that making connections with other witches and wizards was almost as important as the craft itself.

Hale really wasn’t one to enforce that, at least not for him, but he’s sure she knows her fair share of sorcerers throughout the world.

So he puts on his best clothes, and maybe puts a glamour charm on them to make them a bit more on par with the sort of thing Erica’s companions would have. And while Stiles prefers simple shirts and breeches, he is quite fond of the deep red robes that he’d chosen for the occasion. 

Sure that Hale won’t be back that night, Stiles makes sure to lock the place up tighter than usual, bespelling the lock so only he or Hale could open it. The fountain seems to be having a bit of trouble flowing strongly, but he doesn’t pay it much mind.

Finding Erica’s house is a bit tricky with the wall-to-wall houses, but luckily Kingsbury takes pride in its organisation, so once he’s in the right neighbourhood, finding the house number is a sitch.

Once he’s on the stoop, however, he almost backs out. The party could have only just started, voices inside babbling cheerfully. He starts to panic that maybe this party involves supper, and he has absolutely no knowledge of high-class manners. He’s a fast learner, sure, but not that fast.

He’s about to turn around and walk right back to the shop when the door opens to reveal Isaac Lahey, and it’s just Stiles’ luck that Erica would be pals with the sorcerers Stiles had been hoping to avoid.

Lahey looks just as surprised as Stiles. “Master apprentice,” he says. “Can I help you?”

“Uh, Erica invited me. I hope I’m not terribly late…?” 

“Stiles?” Erica joins Lahey at the door, grinning at the sight of him. “You came! Come in, come in, we were just getting started.” She grabs his hand and drags him into the drawing room, where a good number of witches and wizards are milling about, but all look up when they enter.

“Everyone, this is Stiles, the master apprentice I was telling you about. Stiles, these are some of Vernon’s colleagues.” An incredibly well-dressed man steps forward and kisses Erica’s temple. “This is Vernon Boyd, the king’s tracking expert.”

“Pleasure to meet you, Stiles. Erica speaks fondly of you.” He shakes Stiles’ hand firmly, his voice far too smooth to be fair. 

“The pleasure is mine.” Stiles pastes on a smile and already regrets coming, as more of the guests come forward to greet him. He easily forgets half their names as soon as Erica introduces them, but a couple of them stand out as her closer friends. Isaac Lahey, a Jackson Whittemore, a Lydia Martin. They all seem eager to meet him, especially those closer to Erica and Boyd. 

After the introductions, it gets a bit easier. Erica finds him a chair and makes sure he’s included in the conversations happening around him a bit too fast for him to keep up with. Isaac seems just as quiet as he, and keeps sending Stiles wide-eyed glances that Stiles can’t figure out. Erica keeps the both of them occupied enough that they don’t get a moment alone until the servants of the house bring out a light meal of meats and cheeses for them to snack on.

Isaac and Stiles are the only two to remain seated while the other guests get up to fix themselves plates, left in the corner on some of the comfiest chairs Stiles has ever sat in.

Isaac sends him another look and Stiles sighs. “Out with it, Lahey: what is it?”

He jumps a little, as if he hadn’t expected Stiles to speak to him. “Sorry, what?”

“You keep looking at me. Do I have something on my face?”

“What? No, it’s, ah.” Isaac avoids his eye now. “Derek, he came to see you as well?”

Stiles raises a brow. “Yes, and?”

“He’s not missing, per se, but, um. We haven’t heard from him since he left.” Isaac’s leg starts to bounce nervously, like he expects Stiles to snap at him.

After a moment of thought, Stiles tells him quietly, “I helped him with a finding spell for Cora. I assume he went after her.”

Isaac side-eyes him. “Derek went to you for help?”

Stiles shrugs and sinks down a little bit in his chair, despite knowing this is perhaps not the proper crowd for such things. “He said something was blocking the rest of you folk.” He nods to the snacking sorcerers.

“Yes, there was. It was blocking everyone. How were you able to do anything?” Stiles shrugs again, but Isaac doesn’t seem satisfied with this answer. “Surely you must know. It would take more power than every sorcerer I know to break the enchantment stopping us.”

“Derek said whoever is doing it underestimates me? Whatever that means. Do you all talk so cryptically?”

Isaac’s frown only deepens, and he looks up to catch Erica’s eye. After a silent exchange of information, she nods and starts moving about the room, whispering to certain guests. 

“What are you doing?” Stiles asks Isaac, watching Erica flit about the crowd. 

“I think we should convene,” he says, completely unhelpfully. 

“Have I done something wrong?”

Isaac tugs at the lobe of his ear fretfully. “I don’t think so, but with Derek gone…”

Before he quite knows what’s happening, most of the guests have left, and Erica is leading the remainder of them down the hall to the dining room. She seats herself between Stiles and Boyd, patting his arm reassuringly, only making the whole situation even more concerning.

There are only a handful of them, just over half a dozen, but with all of their attention on Stiles, it seems like many more.

When the silence has stretched on a bit too long for his liking, Stiles asks, “So, uh, what’s going on?”

Isaac gets to his feet, and exudes more confidence than Stiles has seen from him. “This is the master apprentice that both Cora and Derek came to see before they disappeared,” he announces to the group, which is followed quickly by whispering and nervous looks in Stiles’ direction.

“Are you saying he’s the reason they’re gone?” Jackson Whittemore asks, making Stiles jump.

“No, I think he can help us figure out what happened,” Isaac quickly amends before the whispering gets out of hand. “He was able to perform a finding spell on Cora.”

Instead of whispering, the room goes quiet, even Erica looking at him funny.

“Derek said someone was underestimating me?” he says weakly, sliding down a bit in his chair. 

“Stiles, not just anyone would be able to break that enchantment,” Erica tells him. 

“But I didn’t break any enchantment. Derek said whatever was blocking you wasn’t blocking me. That I wouldn’t be suspected? I didn’t actually do anything.”

Stiles is use to be interrupted, so that this group lets him finish cuts his thoughts short anyway.

Lydia is the one to explain, “The enchantment blocking us is blocking everyone. We’ve even asked some of our friends in other cities to try. Derek must know something we don’t, if he knew you could perform the spell.”

“Perhaps he combined powers with yours?” Isaac suggests, but Stiles shakes his head, still confused.

“No, I had done it the night before.”

“What, why?”

Stiles clears his throat awkwardly. “Instinct? Maybe I felt responsible, I don’t know.”

Boyd speaks for the first time. “Why would you be responsible?”

“She ran off right after I mentioned my master. Derek, too, when I met him in Port Haven.”

The whole group just looks more confused. “Your master?”

“Hale? And I don’t know her first name, before you ask.”

Isaac and Erica exchange wide-eyed looks and jump over each other to say, “Laura Hale?”

“I said I don’t know, alright? She’s not exactly very open with me. What’s so significant about the name Hale, anyway? Are they related, Cora and my master?”

“If it’s Laura, they are. Derek too.” Isaac says this offhandedly, but it surprises Stiles more than anything that evening.

“Derek is a Hale?”

“Did he not tell you?” Erica asks.

“No, he said he didn’t want my master knowing his name. Or, I think that’s why?”

Lydia gets to her feet to pace, snapping her fingers in agitation. “Derek sure has been keeping secrets, hasn’t he?” she mumbles to herself. 

Everyone else mutters amongst themselves until Stiles interrupts, “I’m sorry, but if my master is Laura Hale, why would Derek want to avoid her? Family squabbles?”

Lydia stops pacing to turn to him. “As far as we know, Laura Hale, as well as the rest of the Hales, are dead. Cora and Derek should be the last of their family.”

“Then… what if my master just happens to have their name?”

“I suppose it’s possible, but it just doesn’t make any sense.” Lydia resumes her pacing, some of her hair falling loose from her curls. “There’s a piece we’re missing, that Derek seems to have. But as he’s fallen off the face of the earth, we can’t just ask him.”

“They’re in Port Haven?”

Lydia halts as the room falls quiet again. “What?”

“At least, that’s where Cora was when I did the spell the other night. Derek would have gone there to find her, wouldn’t he?” He looks ‘round at the group, but there’s a familiarity that isn’t there that makes their eyes feel cold. “Why wouldn’t Derek have told you where he’d gone?”

“We don’t know, Stiles.” Erica leans her chin into her hand, looking upset. “Something must have happened, but he’s keeping it pretty close to his chest.”

“He’s good at that,” Isaac agrees. 

Lydia rubs at the bridge of her nose and sits back down. She looks to the grandfather clock in the corner and sighs slowly. “It’s getting late, friends. I think we should reconvene tomorrow to sort out what we’re to do about Derek, and Cora.”

 

Erica walks Stiles to the door while everyone else gathers their things, a comforting hand back on his arm. “I know everything is really confusing right now, Stiles, but you’ve really helped us a great deal.”

Stiles snorts. “Why am I involved in all of this, again?”

Erica smiles a little. “Unfortunately, Derek has a knack of pulling people into things against their, and his, will. We’ll make sure nothing happens to you, alright?”

“See, I believe that.” He smiles back and kisses her cheek. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Get some sleep, Stiles.”

 

.|XV|.

 

Sleep he does not, which is perhaps why everything just feels like a dream. 

He reorganises the entire shelving system, changes out the old twine for a nicer, green one, and cleans the whole shop by midnight. The skull chatters at him in concern, but Stiles can’t really get a coherent word out of him, so the skull is mostly ignored. 

Even after he’s cleaned, his manic energy hasn’t dissipated at all, and the lack of anything to do only makes him more jittery. He tries to make a set of runes, consults his crystal ball three times in ten minutes, and makes himself a hot chocolate, but nothing really helps. Trying to analyse his feelings does nothing, leaving him more confused about his restlessness than before; he wonders if any of the royal sorcerers are sleeping tonight.

A bit before dawn, Stiles forces himself to sit down, but the leftover ingredients from his finding spell for Cora are _right there_  and he can’t help himself. Before he knows it, he has a finding spell for Derek completed save for the scrap of paper for his name. 

Then he starts to wonder if maybe Isaac, or Boyd, or Lydia have already made a spell for Derek. 

“ _Finish what you start,_ ” the skull rasps at him, making him jump. When he looks up, the skull is just as still as before, if moved a bit to the left. 

Stiles sticks his tongue out at it, but pricks his thumb again and scribbles out Derek’s name. He sorts through the pile of papers on his workbench for the map and lays it out before dropping the slip of paper into the spell.

It spits bright red sparks at him this time, and instead of the vague location they’d given him for Cora, all of the sparks land in one spot in the moors outside Port Haven. Stiles stares at the spot with a frown. Why was Derek in the moors? He’d had more than enough time to make it to the town by now, especially if he had used a spell.

“Should I go after him?” he asks the skull, and he seems to blink back. “Or should I wait for Lydia and them?”

The skull considers for a moment. “ _I think your instinct knows better than I._ ”

Stiles looks back to the map, then takes a deep breath. “Right,” he mutters to himself.

He dumps the remains of the spell in the trash and hurries about the the shop for his jacket, his lantern and a traveling spell that he hopes hasn’t gone rancid in the cupboards. He yanks on his thickest boots and has to run upstairs for his gloves, but when he makes it back down, he supposes he is as ready as he’ll ever be; he gives the skull a pat on his way to the courtyard.

He sets up the traveling spell on the edge of the fountain, carefully lighting it on fire as he thinks about the Port Haven moors, hard. 

With a sickening _zip_ , Stiles feels as if his body is being pulled every which way, with his lungs in his toes and his stomach in his throat. But it is over as quickly as it had started, as the spell drops him into the pre-dawn marshes with a vile squelching sound. 

He swears and nearly topples over, but catches himself on the nearest juniper tree. He pulls his boots out of the mud as he looks around, pleased to find himself in the mandrake clearing, just as planned. He shuffles about for his map and checks his position, lighting his lamp when he’s sure where to go.

The brush birds are starting to chirp and cluck, so dawn must be close, but Stiles doesn’t really have any idea what time it is, or how long he searches the moors. The small burn on the map shifts every now and then, but it isn’t a very detailed map, so he isn’t sure how far Derek has moved in relation to himself.

But he trusts his feet and his twitching nose, following them through the thick shrubs and sparse trees.

He finds the wolf quite by accident, his nose in the map instead of looking where he’s going. He trips right over the wolf and belly-flops into the mud with a yelp, and the wolf jumps up with a rather terrifying snarl.

Stiles rolls over and holds up his hands before the wolf can charge, the wolf instead freezing and looking him up and down with wide, red eyes, tongue half-out in surprise.

“Hi,” Stiles stutters out. “Sorry, I didn’t know you were— oof.” The wolf jumps at him and knocks him over again, but instead of tearing out his throat, it makes a loud keening sound and rubs all over him, not unlike a cat. “Whoa, hey, calm down, get off—” 

It takes the wolf a moment to understand, but it finally rolls off of him and stands to the side to let Stiles catch his breath and get up. He pushes himself to his feet and brushes himself off, though it does little to get the mud off his front. 

He looks down at the wolf. “Thank you.” The wolf chuffs.

Stiles shakes his head and bends down to grab his map, starting to fold it before he sees the burn has gone bright red again. And that means—

He jerks his head back up. “Derek?”

The wolf yips and wags his tail. 

Stiles straightens and looks down at the wo— at Derek in disbelief. “You were the wolf?” Derek yips again. “You, uh, said you were cursed?” Another yip. “So… why were you human the last time I saw you?”

Derek of course doesn’t say anything, and Stiles figures that if he could be human right now, he would be. Which does make thing quite a bit harder.

“Okay, uh.” He unfastens his coat to go through the inside pockets for another traveling spell. “I’m going to take you to Erica, alright?” Derek starts to growl again. “Okay, Derek, I know you probably just want to find Cora, but, no offence, you can’t really do much right now?” When Derek doesn’t stop, Stiles mutters a silencing spell, much to Derek’s chagrin. “Oh, don’t pout.”

He sets up the spell and lights a match, beckoning to Derek. “Come on. I can’t travel to the middle of the city, so we have a lot of walking to do before the sun’s up.”

Reluctantly, Derek joins him, and Stiles drops the match. 

 

It’s much easier than Stiles had expected to get through the city and not run into anybody. Avoiding night watchmen is as easy as ducking into alleys, and Derek’s size certainly makes it easy for him to keep up with Stiles.

The sun is just starting to rise over the castle when they make it to Erica’s house, Stiles knocking on the door urgently. He says a quick spell to make sure it’s Erica that answers, and not some poor servant, and Derek looks up at him curiously as he sits back on his haunches.

It takes a few minutes for Erica to open the door, looking only half awake as she tries to tie her dressing gown.

“Stiles, it’s four in the morn—” She stutters to a stop as she sees Derek, and Stiles smiles sheepishly. 

“I, uh, found Derek?”

Boyd appears over her shoulder, halfway through asking what the matter is before he sees Derek too. “Stiles, what’s…?”

Derek stands and chuffs at them, but they don’t seem to recognise him.

“Look, I know this doesn’t make sense, but this is Derek, and we should probably go inside before someone sees us.”

Erica looks between Stiles and Derek, mouth slightly parted, but nods and steps back to let them into the entryway. 

Stiles takes off his muddy jacket, still a bit shivery from the marshes, and glares at Derek until he wipes his paws on the mat. Erica and Boyd are just watching them, looking as if they think Stiles is going a bit crazy. He certainly feels like he’s going crazy.

Derek looks up at him with more trust than anyone has looked at him with, and Stiles starts to think he’s a little in over his head.

He rubs a hand over his face. “I know it sounds crazy, alright? Is there… someway to prove it to you?”

Erica exchanges a glance with Boyd. “Um, Derek gave us a bowl for our engagement party. If the… wolf can find it, we’ll listen.” Boyd nods in agreement.

Derek chuffs up at Stiles as if to say he isn’t an errand dog, but Stiles nudges him with his knee until he squeezes past their hosts to trot down the hallway. 

After a moment, Stiles follows, hearing Erica and Boyd start after him. They trail behind Derek as he finds the kitchen and paws at a low cupboard until it opens; he pulls out an absolutely horrid-looking, lopsided bowl and sets it in the middle of the kitchen. 

“ _That’s_  the bowl?” Stiles asks in disgust and Derek growls at him.

Erica stands in the doorway, looking as if the situation is finally dawning on her. “He made it,” she says absentmindedly.

“Oh. Uh, sorry, pal.” He pats Derek’s head but only gets another growl.

Erica rubs her eyes. “Okay, so Derek is a wolf. Do we know why?”

“Uh, I think he’s cursed.” When looked to for confirmation, Derek just shrugs. “I think whoever doesn’t want us finding Cora did it?” Derek shrugs again.

“Vernon, do you know how to break such an enchantment?”

Boyd crouches down to inspect Derek closer, but he shakes his head. “I wouldn’t even know where to start,” he says. “There’s more layers to this spell than I know what to do with.” He looks up at Stiles.

Stiles blinks. “What?”

“What do you think can be done?”

“Me?” Stiles splutters. “I’m just an apprentice!”

“But you found Derek, and Cora.” Boyd straightens, looking confused.

“If you hadn’t noticed, no, I haven’t actually found Cora. And I found Derek by accident?”

Erica steps forward and puts her hand on Boyd’s arm. “Vernon,” she admonishes, then turns to Stiles. “I’m sorry that you’re in the middle of this, Stiles. But out of us, you seem to know the most. I don’t think it’s any accident that you were able to find Derek.”

Stiles sighs, but allows Derek to nudge into his hand. “I know just as much as the rest of you; you know everything I know.”

Erica shakes her head. “Okay, Stiles. Now, it’s late, or early, I suppose. Sit.” She pulls out a chair from one of the counters.

 

.|XVI|.

 

Erica gets him a blanket and a cup of strong tea while Boyd disappears to their library to research. Derek settles across Stiles’ feet with sad, sympathetic puppy eyes, and Stiles feels marginally better.

Erica sits next to him, holding her own little cup of tea. “You know, Stiles, I don’t think you give yourself nearly enough credit.”

Stiles huffs and blows some of the steam off his tea. “I think you give me too much.”

She shakes her head and leans an elbow onto the table. She looks down at Derek, putting her chin in her palm. “Derek senses something about you,” she says, smiling a bit. “And if I’ve learned anything from living here, it’s that you trust Derek.”

“How long have you lived here?” Stiles asks.

“Oh, just about five years, I think. Vernon wanted to train at the palace and I was sick of my little town.” Her smile goes wistful. “Neither of us have much to go back to, so after he finished his apprenticeship, we decided to stick around.”

Stiles tilts his head. “He only apprenticed for five years?”

“Oh, he had years of study under his grandmother before we moved.” She stirs her tea with her finger, running it along the rim of her teacup. “We moved out here when she died.”

Nodding, Stiles looks down into his tea. It’s a beautiful bronze colour and smells amazing, but he can’t quite bring himself to take a sip. “Where are you from?”

“You probably haven’t heard of it,” she laughs. “It’s just over the Lantern Wastes.”

Stiles perks up, startling Derek a little. “So am I! Where from? I lived on the outskirts of Beacon Hills.”

“No kidding!” She sets down her cup. “We were just south of there, in Lantern Valley.”

Grinning, Stiles cozies down into his blanket a bit more, definitely feeling better now. “I’ve never met anyone who managed to make it out of the Lantern Wastes; they all just sort of stick around.”

“I as well! Wouldn’t you know, though, Isaac is from around there as well? A bit further south, granted, but apparently Derek met him on one of his many trips and relocated him out here.” 

Stiles looks down at the wolf in question. “He does seem to have a big heart, doesn’t he?”

“Oh, he’d have the world believe otherwise, but he’s really just a big softy. Aren’t you Derek?”

Derek chuffs sleepily, Stiles and Erica laughing. 

“Though, I must admit, he was a bit… bracing when I first met him.”

“How so?” She picks her cup back up again, nudging at Derek a little with her foot; the wolf doesn’t stir. 

“‘Shoved me around a bit when I mentioned my master,” Stiles snorts into his cup.

Erica sends Derek a disapproving look. “Yes, he does have a bit of a temper, but he’s usually better at controlling it. He’s improved a lot since the king started hiring other witches and wizards.”

“Derek worked alone?”

She nods. “For many years, even with Cora there. It really didn’t do him any good, you know. He acts all aloof and tough, but he likes people.”

Stiles smiles a bit down at him. “Yeah, me too. When I first started working for Hale, I thought I would hate the shop, but really, I enjoy it.”

Erica stands and takes her empty cup to one of the sinks. “Your shop looks thoroughly well traveled; have you moved a lot?”

He shrugs. “We never stay in one place for very long, no. We stayed the longest in Port Haven; almost two years.”

Starting to rummage in one of the cupboards, Erica coos a bit. “Oh, I’d love to travel that much. I don’t mind staying around here, but I think I was happiest when Vernon and I traveled here.” She sits back down with a small plate of chocolate covered biscuits, much to Stiles’ delight.

“Maybe, when this all blows over,” he nods at Derek, “I’ll take you out to Beacon Hills. The meadows are absolutely gorgeous in the summer.”

She smiles widely. “I’d like that, Stiles.”

They look up as Boyd gently shoulders open the door, carrying a small stack of books. He looks between the two of them, and smiles a little. “I’m glad to see you two getting along.” He pulls up another chair and opens the first book on the stack. “I thought it would be less lonely for me to work in here,” he explains.

Erica leans over to kiss the corner of his mouth. “Vernon, Stiles is from Beacon Hills.”

“Truly?” Boyd brightens.

Stiles laughs, “Truly.” 

“It’s nice to meet others from the Lantern Wastes; it gets terribly lonely out here with all the city folk.”

“I can only imagine.” Stiles takes another biscuit from the plate and burrows back into his blanket. “I’ve never given it much thought; Hale has kept me pretty busy.”

Boyd scratches at his chin. “Actually, I wanted to ask you about that, Stiles.”

“Shoot.”

He starts to drum his fingers on the edge of his book. “Laura had… quite the reputation before she died, though I suppose that was a bit before your time. What I mean to say is, her reputation was very attractive to a lot of people, especially since she didn’t like to show herself much.”

Stiles sets down his biscuit, suddenly a bit queasy. “You think my master stole her reputation?”

“I think it is a possibility we should consider.”

He nods and wraps his blanket tighter around himself. “Surely _someone_  would have noticed, though? Someone who knew what she looked like?”

“I don’t know, Stiles. Laura was very secretive, and so seems your master.” Boyd rises to get himself a cup of tea.

“Is there any possibility that my Hale is Laura? Any at all? That would certainly make all of this easier.”

“I don’t think so,” Erica says. “It… was an open casket funeral.”

Stiles swallows and nods again. “Something has always been off about Hale,” he admits slowly. “I haven’t met many other witches, or wizards, but she’s odd, you know?” Erica nods understandingly. “I never did know why she took me in, really. My father said it was a favour, but she really doesn’t seem the type to return favours.”

Boyd pauses in pouring hot water into his cup. “Stiles, are you perhaps a spark?”

Stiles looks up in surprise. “What?”

“If Hale is as powerful as we think, and dark enough to have killed Laura, she could be trying to improve her reputation by training a spark.” He sits back down, and Erica looks confused.

“What’s a spark? I haven’t heard you mention them before.”

“They’re, how to say, like a magical battery. Quite rare.”

“And incredibly powerful,” Stiles adds, a bit bitterly. “Of which I am not.”

Boyd doesn’t seem to agree. “The point is, if you _were_  a spark, Hale could certainly be using that to move herself up in the world a bit.”

Stiles shakes his head, unconvinced. “Hale is a bragger, and I’ve never heard her mention it.”

“Well, there are ways of harnessing a spark’s power; maybe she didn’t want other witches and wizards to catch wind of you?”

Erica interrupts before Stiles can keep arguing. “Vernon, can’t you tell if Stiles is a spark?”

“No, I’m not nearly powerful enough. I don’t think even Derek would be able to tell, not without knowing Stiles for quite some time.” Boyd sips at his tea thoughtfully. “There are spells, but I think we should focus on getting Derek back to normal first.”

“So do I,” Stiles grumbles.

Erica sighs and pats his knee, but turns back to Boyd. “Have you found anything that will help?”

“Not yet. Most magical books are about werewolves, so are quite useless.”

“What’s a werewolf?” Stiles asks.

Both Erica and Boyd look at him in surprise. “Don’t you know? There were quite a few stories about the wolves of the Lantern Wastes.”

“‘Must not have reached Beacon Hills? We never had any wolves.”

Considering this, Boyd explains, “They’re part man, part wolf. Depending on the lore, they either turn into wolves around full moons, or can transform at will.”

Stiles glances back down to the sleeping Derek. “And… why would Derek not be a werewolf?”

“Well, whoever is trying to hide Cora turned him into a wolf.”

Stiles shifts uncomfortably, and doesn’t know whether or not to keep his mouth shut about this too. Erica notices immediately. “What do you know, Stiles?”

He clears his throat. “I met Derek, as a wolf, before all of this.”

“How do you mean?” Boyd asks.

“I, uh, saw him as a human around town a couple of times, but twice, I met him as a wolf, out on the moors. I didn’t know he was Derek at the time, though!”

Boyd gets up to pace, glancing at Derek every now and then, and he looks hurt. “I suppose Derek didn’t have to tell us, but that’s quite a big secret to keep.”

Erica nods in agreement, looking just as upset. “I wonder if Cora knows? What about Isaac?”

“He, uh, must have a good reason to keep it from you,” Stiles says, as comforting as he can be. “Maybe it’s a new thing?”

“It is possible, I suppose.” Boyd runs a hand over his face and sadly sits back down. Erica wraps an arm around him, and Stiles feels guilty. 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t know.”

“Oh, it’s not your fault, Stiles. It’s best that we know, in order to help him, and I’m sure he’ll understand.” Erica nudges his half-eaten biscuit closer to him. 

Stiles picks it up and starts chewing on it miserably. 

Somewhere in the house, a door slams and is followed by running feet. Boyd quickly gets up. “That was the front door,” he says to himself as Erica rises as well.

The kitchen door bursts open to reveal a panting Isaac, even paler than he had been when he’d come to Stiles about Cora. 

Erica rushes forward. “Isaac, what’s happened?”

“It’s Kate,” he says breathlessly, Boyd and Erica freezing. 

Stiles asks, “What’s Kate?” and Isaac seems to notice him for the first time.

“Who’s been stopping us from going after Cora; she’s… she’s bad news.” Isaac looks at Derek and gives a legitimate jump, but Derek seems purely content to keep sleeping. “What’s Derek doing like that?” Isaac squeaks. 

“You knew?” Erica demands, and Stiles knows she doesn’t blame Isaac, not really, but she’s hurt, and one of her best friends is a wolf, so he thinks she gets some leeway. 

Isaac flinches and looks from Stiles to Derek and back. “I, uh, am too? A wolf, I mean. Derek made me swear not to tell anyone!” 

“That’s enough for now,” Boyd says before Erica can keep asking questions. “Isaac, how do you know it’s Kate?”

He blinks. “Oh! She was the one who came to the castle the other day. The king had me look into her, because he’d never heard of her, so I did a tracing spell and it’s definitely her.”

“You got a look at her face?”

“She wasn’t very careful,” Isaac says. “And to even show up in Kingsbury means she doesn’t think we can take her.”

“I’m sorry, but who is Kate?” Stiles asks again, hoping for a better answer this time. 

Erica waits until it’s clear neither Isaac or Boyd are going to answer. “She’s the one who killed Cora and Derek’s family. We thought Derek had managed to banish her to the neighbouring kingdom, but if she’s already in Kingsbury…”

“She must have known about Derek’s wolf,” Isaac says, shakily sitting in Erica’s vacated chair. She rummages in another cupboard and brings him his own blanket. 

“What does she want with Cora, though?” Boyd wonders, starting to pace again. “Why is she keeping us from finding her? Cora is wonderful, yes, but she isn’t exactly something special enough for Kate to go after.”

“And why didn’t she just kill Derek?” Erica sits in Boyd’s chair, rubbing Isaac’s back.

“It’s possible she couldn’t, not with Derek as a wolf.” 

“No,” Stiles says, surprising himself. “I think she’s trying to gloat?” He looks around at his companions. “She must have known we’d find him, and know we wouldn’t be able to do anything. She’s toying with us.”

“I think you’re right,” Boyd says. “That really is something Kate would do.”

Stiles chews at the inside of his lip, curling his toes inside his boots. “Then what do _we_  do?”

Erica looks out the tiny kitchen window, and Stiles realises it’s well past sunrise by now. “ _We_  are going back to bed,” Erica decides. “It’s far too early, and I’m sure you haven’t slept a wink.” She says this to Stiles as she moves over to help him to his feet. Derek is only disturbed a little, rolling over so Stiles can step away from the chair. “We’ll put together a searching spell for Kate once we’ve all slept a little longer, so don’t you worry; come over in the evening? We can catch you up then.” Stiles nods. 

“You’re welcome to stay with us, though, Stiles,” Boyd tells him. 

“No, no, that’s fine, I’ll just go home. I have to make sure no one’s broken into the shop anyway.” He looks down at Derek. “I think it’d be best if he stays here?”

“Of course. Isaac, you’re not going all the way back to the castle. Up to the guest room with you,” Erica shoos Isaac towards the door while Boyd helps gather Stiles’ things. He helps Stiles into his muddy jacket, and Stiles makes a mental note to put a self-cleaning spell on it. 

“Thank you for your help, Stiles,” Boyd says, too sincere for Stiles’ liking.

He waves him off. “I just found him for you. But thank you as well; you all have been nothing but kind.”

Boyd shrugs. “What kind of public servants would we be?”

Stiles snorts and opens the door. “I’ll see you this evening.

“Travel safe, Stiles.”

 

.|XVII|.

 

Stiles really didn’t think he’d be able to sleep, but he crashes on the low couch by the fire and falls asleep faster than he ever has.

When he wakes, it’s well past noon, rapidly approaching supper, and he just lays there for a while, too groggy to move. His feet are strangely cold, and the ring around his thumb too warm, and it’s this that eventually makes him roll off the couch in search of new socks and a chain to put the ring on.

Hale doesn’t look like she’s been back yet, which Stiles can only count as lucky.

He makes himself some eggs and toast, not sure his stomach could take much more, and sits at his workbench to eat. The skull has definitely moved since he’d last seen it, but he supposes that’s normal with magic objects like that.

He gets to his feet to the light the fire, but has only just done that when the front door slams open and Hale strides up the steps with a purpose that makes Stiles’ stomach drop.

He tries to greet her, but finds he can’t move. Not even his mouth will open as he stands rooted to the spot.

“Sorry, Stiles,” Hale says, not sounding very sorry at all, “but the royal sorcerers are looking into me, and I’m going to need an extra kick to get out of here.”

Frozen as he is, Stiles can’t watch her start going around the shop, but from the noise, it sounds like she’s collecting herbs. She piles a great many parcels and jars on the table, starting to dump nearly all of them into a great wooden bowl that appears out of nowhere.

Stiles’ nose starts to twitch as more ingredients are added, and then it clicks. He looks at her in horror, and is absolutely livid with himself for not realising sooner.

_Kate_  turns around to grab some of the ashes from the lit fireplace and notices his expression. “What, you didn’t think I was keeping you around for kicks, did you?” She sneers a bit and puts the ashes into the bowl. The spell starts to emit a noxious smell that makes him want to vomit, but he can’t move to do even that.

Kate looks down at the spell with a satisfied expression then strides over to Stiles. “You know, I was lucky your mother had already kicked the bucket when you father handed you over to me, or I would have never managed to get you away from them.” She grabs Stiles by the arm and drags him over to the table. She forces him to his knees and yanks his arm over the bowl, pulling a white-hilted knife from her belt. And Stiles still can’t move, and his throat won’t make a noise.

She pauses and looks down at him. “You know, I never did understand why she didn’t tell him you were a spark. ‘Would’ve made protecting you easier.” She slices off his sleeve. 

Stiles’ panic leaps to a pounding in his ears, and his skin seems to burn where Kate touches him. 

She starts to draw the blade down the centre of his arm, deeper than Stiles expected, and he manages a scream behind his teeth. Kate looks impressed. “I’d been training you up to make your spark more powerful, but perhaps it is powerful enough as it is.”

Just before the tip of the blade reaches his wrist, the door all but explodes into splinters as a black blur leaps into the room and knocks Kate away from Stiles. Everyone ends up on the floor, one of the chair smashed to pieces by Derek’s considerable weight.

Kate screams and lunges at Derek, her concentration broken enough that Stiles can feel her spell leave his body with a snap. He collapses onto his back to catch his breath, watching Derek and Kate wrestle out of the corner of his eye.

It takes him a moment to bite back the pain and roll over, looking up at the woman that had practically raised him since he was thirteen, but finds there’s no feeling of betrayal there; he had expected this. 

Kate manages to throw Derek across the shop into one of the glass cupboards with a screech of triumph. Stiles decides now or never and grabs the nearest broken chair leg, running at Kate. She looks up but doesn’t react fast enough to stop him from swinging at her with all his strength. 

She stumbles back and trips over the grate, slipping into the fire. 

Time doesn’t slow down, Kate doesn’t have one last long moment as human, she simply bursts into ash with a scream that rings in Stiles’ ears, the fire exploding into bright green light for a split second before returning to normal yellow as if it had never happened at all.

Stiles stands in front of the fireplace, holding the chair leg and feels oddly… numb? He supposes that’s what happens when you kill someone.

He nearly jumps out of his skin as Derek starts to get back to his feet, staring at Stiles as if still processing what has happened.

Then he blinks and shifts back into a human in one, fluid motion, closing the space between the two of them in three steps. He pulls Stiles into a hug and Stiles realises he’s shaking. Instead of shirking away from the contact, Stiles drops the chair leg and lets himself be held, and if the way Derek is clinging to him is any thing to go by, he needs this just as much.

After a long minute just standing there, in a room that aside from a broken chair looks like nothing amazing had really happened, Derek pulls back. “Are you alright?”

“Probably.” Stiles forces a small smile. “You?”

“I have accelerated healing.” 

Stiles shakes his head with a snort. “Of course you do.”

Derek looks ready to say something else, then notices Stiles arm and blanches. “‘Got here just in time, didn’t I?” he says weakly.

Stiles laughs hoarsely. “You cut it a little close, yeah.”

Derek shakes his head and leads him to the table, gently sitting him on one of the unbroken chairs. He finds the bandages immediately, as if he’d known where they were, and quickly patches Stiles up.

Derek is tying off the bandages when Stiles asks, “How did you know?”

Derek sighs. “Whatever spell she had on me had me sleeping more than I could keep up with; I missed nearly everything you had discussed with Erica and Boyd. Boyd was catching me up when he mentioned you being a spark, and I knew Kate would go after you next.”

Stiles chews at his lip and glances at the fireplace. “How did you know it was Kate?”

Derek taps his fingers on his thigh, looking agitated. “Isaac said they were looking for her, and I’d already had my suspicions that whoever your master was had killed Laura. When Isaac said Kate had been at the castle, I put the pieces together. So did you, it seems.”

“A bit too late on my part,” Stiles admits, tearing off the remains of his sleeve.

“Stiles, I’m sorry. I should have realised sooner. She went after Laura’s spark, and I knew from the moment I met you that you were too, but I didn’t think.”

“Laura was a spark?”

Derek is silent for a moment before giving a short laugh. “You would focus on that. Yes, she was; that’s why she kept to herself so much. Not many people know how to harness a spark’s power, but there are those who do.” He nods to the fireplace and Stiles gets a bit queasy again. 

“Speaking of, I would like to get out of here as soon as possible, if you wouldn’t mind.” It seems a waste to abandon the contents of the shop, but the thought of taking anything that belonged to Kate makes his blood boil.

“I should go tell Erica and Boyd why I ran off like that; they’re probably worried. C’mon.” Derek helps him to his feet.

 

.|XVIII|.

 

Derek helps gather his few possessions, since Stiles is about ready to keel over and sleep for a year, but Derek makes him stay awake for fear he’d lost too much blood.

He does support Stiles a bit on their way to Erica’s, and they get several strange looks, but the streets are mercifully mostly empty. No one seems to recognise them, which is a blessing in it of itself, though by the time Derek is knocking on Erica’s door, Stiles starts to think Derek had bespelled them to be disguised.

Isaac opens the door immediately, taking one look at them before pulling them into the house. Erica and Boyd meet them in the hall, Erica making a horrified sound at the sight of Stiles leaning on Derek.

“Hiya,” he says feebly. 

They shuffle them all to the sitting room, Derek easing Stiles onto the longest couch. He reminds him not to fall asleep, while Stiles waves him off.

“What on earth happened?” Erica demands as a servant brings in a tray of tea and small sandwiches. She looks at Derek for answers, but Stiles pipes up,

“Kate was my master.”

The blood in Boyd’s face drains. “We hadn’t even thought…”

Stiles shrugs. “Neither did I.”

“Is she still out there?” Isaac asks from the doorway, looking ready to bolt. 

Derek exchanges a quick look with Stiles. “No, she’s taken care of. She won’t be bothering us.”

Isaac sits in the nearest chair with a long breath of relief. “What went down?”

Before Stiles can respond, Derek interrupts, “A story for another time. Stiles needs to rest, but he’s lost a lot of blood.”

Erica nods in understanding. “I’ll get the tea,” she says, but Stiles has no idea what she’s talking about.

Looking down at him, Derek explains, “It will make sure your heart rate doesn’t drop while you sleep.”

“I didn’t know such a thing existed.”

“Isaac invented it.” He nods to Isaac, who looks a little bashful. 

“With Derek’s help,” he mumbles. 

Derek sits on the couch by Stiles’ feet, rubbing his hands over his face and sighing wearily. “That was more excitement than I want to experience again,” he says to no one in particular.

Erica returns with a steaming cup and helps Stiles sit up to drink it. He mumbles a thanks over the lip of the mug.

Erica steps back and inhales a breath before asking, “So, what about Cora?”

“She’s not dead,” Derek answers immediately, to the obvious relief of the room. “I had just founds her when Kate put that spell on me. She didn’t want to kill me, but she’s quite good at freezing spells.”

Stiles cringes a little, but no one mentions it, for which he is grateful. Derek does pat his shoulder once, and Stiles’ ring goes warm again.

“What are going to do to get her back?” Isaac pipes up from the corner. 

“I was planning on going to Port Haven tomorrow. She’s in no danger, she can wait another night.”

Erica nods in agreement. “And you finally have some sense in you not to go gallivanting off when you can’t barely stand up.” She says this to Derek, and he holds up his hands. 

“I wouldn’t be able to perform a travelling spell like this, whether I wanted to or not.”

Stiles snorts, leaning against the arm of the couch and feeling quite sleepy now. “Why doesn’t it surprise me that you’re as impulsive as you look?”

Boyd barks out a laugh. “Derek, I’m quite fond of this one; I say we keep him around.”

Derek opens his mouth in surprise, but no words come out. Erica, on the other hand, bursts into a grin. “Stiles, you’re staying with us until you can afford your own place, you hear? And Derek,”

Derek jumps a little, and his ears are red again; Stiles thinks it’s quite cute. “Yes?”

“Wasn’t Cora looking for an apprentice? As soon as she’s recovered, of course.”

Stiles blinks. “You guys think Cora would want to apprentice me?”

Isaac scoffs. “Why wouldn’t she? She’ll probably be thrilled you had some dark magic training: she’s weirdly obsessed with that stuff. Did Kate ever have you work with mandrakes?”

Stiles swallows and looks around the group. “Was I not supposed to have?”

They all laugh, including Derek, and Stiles decides that’s quite cute as well. 

“No, Stiles. Most sorcerers know to stay away from things like that.”

With a grumble, Stiles pulls his feet onto the couch and curls up even tighter. “Well, who was I to know.”

Hiding another laugh behind her hand, Erica ruffles his hair. “Cora will probably think it’s wonderful. But you’ll both be in recovery for a while, so don’t get any funny ideas.” 

Stiles snorts, and looks down the couch to Derek. “How do you feel about your sister apprenticing me?”

He shrugs and won’t quite meet his eye. “It’s her decision, not mine, but I think you two would make a great match.”

Erica looks between them and she seems to realise something. Whatever it is, she keeps it to herself, but her sly look means nothing good.

 

Stiles remembers nothing else of that evening, nor how he made it to one of the guest room beds, but it’s far softer than anything he’s ever felt. When he wakes, with absolutely no idea what time it is, he almost doesn’t get up at all he’s so comfy.

He burrows deeper into the duvets for a good ‘nother hour, but can’t quite get back to sleep, so he eventually wriggles his way free.

The room is quite lavish for a guest room, and for the first time, he wonders how much royal sorcerers actually make.

He pads over to the thick velvet curtains and pulls them aside to find the only light outside the street lamps. Late then.

But he’s wide awake now, and if he doesn’t get out of the room, at least to find the loo, he’s going to lose his mind. So with that, he eases open the bedroom door, pleased to find it doesn’t squeak, and quietly makes his way down the hall.

Luckily, the first door he tries is the loo.

He then heads downstairs, trusting his feet to avoid creaky steps, and wanders around until he finds the kitchen, maybe hoping for tea. 

When he enters, though, he almost trips over himself, finding Derek at the table with a book and a sandwich. He looks at Stiles with poorly-disguised surprise, looking him up and down, and then to the clock on the wall.

“What are you doing up, Stiles?”

“I could ask you the same thing.” Now too nervous to make tea without asking, he instead finds a glass for water. Derek’s eyes don’t leave him.

“I’ve only just woken up,” Derek says carefully, setting down his book. 

“I as well.” Stiles sits across from him awkwardly, sipping at his water and trying to make it look like he wasn’t as jittery as he is; his bouncing leg betrays him just a bit.

“The tea usually puts people out for longer.” Derek picks at a bit of crust. “None of us were expecting you to be awake until tomorrow afternoon.”

Stiles shrugs, playing with the condensation on his glass. “I’m a little messed up, y’know, up here.” He flaps his hand vaguely to his head. “So I’m not too surprised. Shouldn’t you have been asleep longer as well? I’d almost argue you’ve been through more than me.”

“I wouldn’t say that. And I have no other excuse than I don’t tend to sleep very long, no matter how tired I am.” He still won’t meet Stiles’ eye, and maybe it’s the exhaustion, or the stress of the last month, or maybe Stiles is just done, but he purses his lips and asks, none too gently,

“Have I done something wrong?”

Derek looks taken aback. “What do you mean?”

Stiles waves his hand in Derek’s direction this time. “You’ve gone all shifty around me, ever since last night. I usually expect my friends to tell me when I’ve made them uncomfortable.”

Derek opens his mouth, but then closes it again with a snap. He doesn’t answer for a moment, and only does so because Stiles raises an eyebrow at him. “You think of us as friends?”

“Should I not? You saved my life, I saved yours. Don’t you think the universe is telling us something?”

Derek coughs and looks away _again_ , but this time, he appears to be blushing. And Stiles has never been the fastest with things, but he’s never the last to know either. 

So when it clicks, he nearly topples out of his chair. 

“You— You like me!”

Derek looks panicked and embarrassed all at once. “Keep your voice down, Stiles!”

“No, sorry, no can do.” Stiles doesn’t remember getting to his feet, but he’s now standing in front of his chair, flapping his hands wildly. “What in gods’ name has you attracted to this mess?”

“I never said I was attracted—”

“Don’t try to lie, Derek, you got all pouty when Erica said Cora should apprentice me.”

Derek closes his mouth and glares at him, but his cheeks are a bright pink, and Stiles is _so into this_.

“You, one of the kingdom’s greatest wizards, gone pouty over _me_. This is amazing, I can’t believe this.”

Derek’s frown deepens. “Would you stop saying it like no one would be attracted to you?” Stiles raises an eyebrow as Derek seems to realise what he’d said. “No, I didn’t mean it like that—”

“Yes you did, Der. Admit it. You love me.”

“I will do no such thing.” He crosses his arms over his chest, but Stiles can’t stop grinning. He’d received a lot of curveballs over the past week, and he’s too tired to process this one completely, but he’ll be damned if he doesn’t date _the fuck_  out of Derek Hale.

 

.|XIX|.

 

Stiles goes to bed before he can do something stupid like ask the guy to marry him, but he still leaves him with a peck on the cheek that Derek refuses to acknowledge.

Stiles is up pretty early the next morning, but from the sound of it, so is everyone else. He gets dressed and meets them all in the dining room for breakfast; he takes the seat next to Derek without saying anything.

Erica watches them like she knows, but Boyd and Isaac are oblivious.

Once everyone has eaten their fill, and the plates are cleared away, Erica turns to Derek. “So, Cora?”

Derek fiddles with the edge of a napkin. “I made the travelling spell last night; I’ll be leaving as soon as I can.”

Erica nods. “Vernon and Isaac need to report to the palace, and Stiles needs more rest—” Stiles groans, “— so let’s everyone reconvene this evening for supper. Stiles, if you follow any of them, so help me I will spell you to your bed.”

“Please don’t do that,” Stiles pleads under a smile. “I’ll lose my mind.”

“Then you’ll do as I say.” Quite satisfied with herself, she gives Derek a meaningful look, and Stiles’ smile turns to a grin.

Isaac just looks confused.

 

Stiles is on the couch in the library when Derek leaves, and he doesn’t say anything to him, but Stiles is quite smug with the hesitant goodbye shoulder-touch he gets instead.

Erica joins him a bit before noon, carrying a small plate of sandwiches and a devilish grin.

“So,” she says, sitting on a nearby chaise. “Derek.”

Stiles smirks. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, please. Derek may be subtle, but you are not.” She hands him a turkey and cucumber sandwich. “Spill.”

He shrugs. “Not much to say. M’pretty sure Derek is in denial.”

“He’s always in denial.”

Looking at her over his sandwich, he narrows his eyes. “You knew that was his ring, didn’t you?”

She simpers around a bite of ham. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Stiles rolls his eyes, and they fall into companionable silence as they eat. Once they’re through the whole plate, Erica looking a bit sleepy, Stiles closes his book. 

“Erica, why is Derek interested in me?”

She blinks herself awake, looking confused. “How do you mean?”

“Well, you see,” he shuffles uncomfortably, “he’s what, the court sorcerer’s second in command? He’s got all of you as friends, and seems to have a pretty stable life here. Won’t I just be throwing a wrench in the works?”

Erica frowns. “Surely you must have noticed how lonely he is, even with us around.”

“I mean, yeah, I did, but me?”

“Kate really did a number on your confidence, didn’t she,” she sighs. “Stiles, you may just be an apprentice from a small town, and a little too well-versed in the dark arts, but I shouldn’t think Derek cares about that? None of us do, really. And Derek sees something in you, something he hasn’t seen in any one else. That counts for something.”

Stiles picks at a loose thread on the couch and shrugs. 

Erica grumbles and sits up straighter. “Okay, Stiles, why do you like Derek?”

“What?”

“Why do you like him? All the details. Now.”

Confused, Stiles hesitantly answers, “I don’t know, because he’s nice? And he’s attractive, not going to lie. And I don’t know him that well, but he seems so sure of himself, and cares for you lot more than I’ve seen people care about their blood families, and he doesn’t look at me like I’m a kid. Not that you all do, but it’s different? I don’t know, there’s just something.”

She nods. “And does any of that have to do with status, or magical ability?”

“No.”

“No. So what makes you think Derek will care about that?”

Pulling the thread loose completely, Stiles does try and think about it, he really does, but he’s tired, and his brain doesn’t seem to be working right now. “I don’t know.”

“If you’re worried that he’s resistant now, just know it’s because you’ll be the first person he’s courted in a while. He’s been out of the game for longer than he’d like to admit, and he’s embarrassed.”

Stiles has to scoff at that. “Surely there have been other people to have courted Derek, though?”

“Of course there have, but he’s turned them all down.” She pulls her curls over her shoulder and looks at him meaningfully. “So you’re special, got it?”

He slouches down. “Whatever.”

Erica shakes her head. “You’re impossible.”

 

.|XX|.

 

Derek brings back Cora by supper, who, other than being a bit confused and lost, is perfectly fine. 

Derek spends the rest of the evening catching her up on the past couple of days, and the rest of them more or less give them space. Kate had messed up both their lives, and they deserved to have time to themselves to come to terms with what had happened.

Stiles spends his time in the library, napping in between chapters of a rather interesting novel about pirates. Erica checks in on him every now and then, but seems busy with wedding plans, so he tries not to take up too much of her time. After supper, Isaac joins him and reads for an hour or two, but turns in early, claiming to have an early start the next day.

Stiles is dozing after the last chapter of the book when Derek slips into the library, so quietly, Stiles doesn’t notice until he’s gently touching his arm.

He jumps a little, then yawns. “How’s Cora?” he asks, sitting up and setting aside his book.

Derek sits on the chaise Erica had occupied before. “She’s just gone to bed. She says she’d like to talk to you tomorrow, if that’s alright.”

“Of course. Should I be concerned?”

Derek smiles a little and shakes his head. “No, I don’t think so. None of us told her about apprenticing you, but I think she might be asking anyway.”

Already warm and comfortable, this just makes Stiles grin sleepily. “S’nice to know I’m wanted.”

Derek’s eyes dart away at that, seeming to be memorising the patterns of the carpet. Stiles frowns at him, and nudges him gently.

“I didn’t mean it like that,” he tells him. “If you’d rather not, you know, I don’t mind.”

“No, that’s not…” Derek just looks frustrated now, rubbing at his stubble. “It’s that I don’t know nearly anything about you, and I’d like to, and I’d like you to know more about me.”

Stiles is silent for a moment, and can’t hold back a smile. “Derek, that’s what dates are for.”

He deflates a bit, confused. “What?” 

“Dates. I take you to dinner, you take me to dinner, we talk, we learn about each other. A lot of people don’t know anything about each other before they start courting.”

Derek frowns. “They don’t?”

Stiles snorts and pats him arm. “Erica said it had been a while since you’d courted anyone. Don’t worry, I’ll catch you up.”

He looks up to find Derek watching him, and his eyes are almost too fond to bear. “Can I kiss you?” he asks out of nowhere and Stiles’ brain stutters to a stop.

“What?”

Derek’s lips twitch into that almost-smile, and he leans forward to kiss Stiles, just once. When he pulls back, Stiles is staring at him.

Before either of them can say anything —Stiles almost says thank you— there’s a gasp from the doorway and Cora is standing there, looking both amused and scandalised.

“Derek, that’s disgusting,” she says, then grins and races down the hall. Derek scrambles up to chase after her, with a few choice swears and hexes shouted after her.

Stiles watches the open door, brain still not quite caught up, and wonders why, if Derek didn’t know anything about courting, he had already given Stiles a ring. 

He supposes that’s a thought for another time. 

**Author's Note:**

> they're all so out of character i want to cry. but this got me out of my writer's block so i guess it deserves some credit. but fuck that title. that summary. murder me.


End file.
